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robininthelabyrinth · 3 years

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Wei Wuxian comes back from the Burial Mounds with the inability to lie. Somehow it seems to be a curse inflicted by Suibian- Sandu?- who is not amused by wwx's decision to just give his core away.

Thank you! <3

“You cannot do this to me,” Wei Wuxian hissed at his sword.

His sword did not respond.

This was not a surprise, since it was a sword, and yet Wei Wuxian was convinced that Suibian was to blame for his current dilemma. After all, what else could explain such a very specific issue tied directly to his golden core other than the only other thing he had allowed a direct tie into it?

Besides, everyone knew that spiritual weapons were temperamental, in need of careful care and consideration, and Wei Wuxian had, well, more or less done the one thing that meant he was going to have to give up using Suibian. It made sense that Suibian would be angry enough to curse him.

Also, when Jiang Cheng had handed him Suibian and their hands had been on it at the same moment, the sword – Wei Wuxian would swear – had very briefly vibrated, as if in response to a command.

And ever since then…

Well.

Listen, it’d be one thing if he walked out of the Burial Mounds without the ability to lie, okay? A weird churning compulsion to tell the truth, originating deep in his belly right where his golden core had once been before he’d given it up...yes, it would make sense. It would be – weird, incredibly so, but it wasn’t like his particular brand of demonic cultivation had much precedent, what with all the other variations involving a great deal more murdering people to harvest their power. Not to mention the whole idea of cultivating post-golden core; that wasn’t exactly something that had happened many times before!

So that would have made sense. Since it was new, it was reasonable that there would be side effects, even bizarre side effects.

It was not reasonable that the side effect in question – the inability to lie – had an area of impact that tied directly into the presence of one Jiang Cheng.

No Jiang Cheng? Wei Wuxian could be as free with the truth as he liked.

Jiang Cheng somewhere in the vicinity but not immediately present? He started tripping up on it. Strange restrictions appeared on his tongue, choking him; there seemed to be no logical sense to them or to the way they wove in and out of his speech, presumably depending on where Jiang Cheng was standing at any given moment. Why some exaggerations were acceptable while others were considered untruths and thus forbidden, Wei Wuxian had yet to figure out.

Jiang Cheng standing beside him?

It was time for Wei Wuxian to keep his mouth shut because every word that passed through his lips had to be weighed and found truthful as if he were standing before the judges of the dead.

That was all bad enough, of course, but recently even omissions had started burning at his lips, and that was just very much not on.

“It’s for his own good,” he argued, pleading, beseeching. “You can’t make me tell him. He would only be hurt if he knew!”

Suibian did not respond.

It was, after all, just a sword.

Even if it was currently behaving more like a backstabbing dagger.

(Nie Huaisang would have said that the sword wasn’t acting like anything at all.

Wei Wuxian had circuitously brought up the issue to him on one of his rare visits to the safe back line, reasoning out of sheer desperation that Nie Huaisang was the only person he knew that was gullible enough that he could tell the whole story to him without risking him figuring out the entire thing.

Nie Huaisang had laughed long and hard at it – Wei Wuxian couldn’t really blame him, since he’d claimed it was a story he’d seen in a play and if it had been happening in a play he would’ve found it funny, too – and then said that the playwright had missed the obvious answer: that it wasn’t the sword at all.

What could it be other than the sword, Wei Wuxian had asked.

It’s all in his mind, Nie Huaisang had said. He feels guilty, so he’s doing it to himself, and he’s blaming the sword because it’s the only other thing that he feels guilty towards. What else could it be?)

“Wei Wuxian!” Jiang Cheng called, and Wei Wuxian grimaced, hastily hiding Suibian away so that he could pretend to have forgotten it back at camp - so that no one would ask him to use it. He’d apologize to it later. “Are you ready to go?”

“Physically yes, emotionally no,” Wei Wuxian called back, and heard Jiang Cheng snort like a pig with amusement – at least someone was getting something out of this, and no, he wasn’t counting Nie Huaisang.

He didn’t especially want to go, didn’t want to have to be constantly on mental alert to make sure he didn’t blurt out something stupid and life-destroying, but what could he do about it? In the end, he went.

Jiang Cheng looped an arm over his shoulder. “More Wen sect to kill,” he said, briefly looking tough and serious and even, dare Wei Wuxian think it, manly, and then promptly ruined it by smirking at him with exactly the same sort of dumb face he’d used that one time they'd planned on slipping dye into the water Uncle Jiang used to use to wash his hair. “Emotionally ready for that?”

“Comparatively speaking, yes,” Wei Wuxian said.

Jiang Cheng shook his head. “I’m not going to ask what’s going on with you, because if you wanted me to know, you’d tell me,” he said, demonstrating surprising maturity, and possibly also the receipt of advice from the crumpled letter he’d shoved away half-hidden; Wei Wuxian wondered who Jiang Cheng was corresponding with that would dare give him advice like that. “But – you’ll tell me eventually, right?”

“Yes,” Wei Wuxian said impatiently, and then blinked, surprised at himself.

If he’d said it, here with Jiang Cheng so close, then it must be the truth.

He would tell him.

Maybe not immediately, but – eventually.

When he’d agreed to the golden core transfer, did all those things to keep the secret from Jiang Cheng, to make sure he didn’t know, he’d thought he’d take the secret to his grave. He wanted to. He still thought it would only hurt Jiang Cheng to know what he’d done – Jiang Cheng would take it all the wrong ways, doubt himself, blame himself, hurt himself, when all Wei Wuxian wanted was for him to be happy and healthy.

But – Suibian or no Suibian – he couldn’t lie right now.

And if he couldn’t…eventually, one day, Jiang Cheng would ask.

Something would happen.

He’d find out.

If he did it in an unguarded moment - when Wei Wuxian was drunk, perhaps, or over-tired after battle, or punch-drunk after a close encounter - that would be the worst possible thing. He wouldn’t be able to plan out how to phrase it or how to couch it or how to reassure him; it would be nothing but betrayed looks all the way down and Jiang Cheng storming away and all attendant disasters. He’d have to quit the Jiang sect and go live on a mountain out of sheer shame, and that sounded awful even if he could probably con one of those quiet-loves-solitude types like Lan Wangji into joining him.

And so the only thing to do was…

“Hey, Jiang Cheng,” Wei Wuxian said. Attempt the impossible. “After the battle today, can we – talk?”

“Of course,” Jiang Cheng said, brightening up like the sunrise. “Any time.”

#mdzs #wei wuxian #jiang cheng #my fic #my fics #beefleef

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lunar-wandering · 3 years

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@skellebonez Happy Birthday!!! i have written this fic for you, please enjoy.

'In hindsight, maybe this hadn't been such a good idea.' Was what Macaque thought, as he sat on MK's windowsill, disguised as a cat-

With Wukong, in bird form, standing directly across from him.

Originally, Macaque had decided to hang out around MK's apartment as a cat, purely for recon purposes. Or, well, at least, that's what he told himself. In reality, he was just really concerned about him. But, of course, Macaque wasn't just going to let MK know about that, so the next logical course of action was obviously to spy on him as a cat. Nothing could go wrong with this plan, nothing at all, there would be no unnecessary panic cause by this.

(He ignored how panicked he'd felt when MK had actually opened up his window and let him come in for the first time. Or when MK had started rambling about his day to him. Or when MK had started calling him 'Shadow'. Or when-)

Now though, staring down Wukong, Macaque had to admit, that maybe he hadn't exactly thought this through.

Wukong hopped a bit closer, ruffling his wings a bit, and Macaque lifted one paw to step back, fur bristling as he hissed, which made Wukong pause, head tilting in something akin to amusement.

And then MK opened the window.

"Shadow, what are you hissing at- oh hey Monkey King!" He said, leaning out the window and picking Macaque up, before leaning back to make space for Wukong to change back to normal and enter through the window. Macaque let himself be lifted into the apartment, but sent an intense glare at Wukong as the monkey shifted back to normal, now very obviously looking amused.

"So this is the cat you've been talking about, bud?" He asked, not fully entering the room, instead choosing to sit on the windowsill. "You've been showing up late to practice because you've been distracted talking to this guy?"

"Yeah, why do you ask?" MK set Macaque down on the ground, the shadow monkey quickly moving to put some distance between himself and the other two. "What, are you jealous of a cat?"

"No." Wukong denied, seemingly struggling for a proper response. Macaque watched as the other monkey's eyes lit up with an idea, and oh, Macaque had a feeling he wasn't going to like this. "Just, well, it's a stray cat right?"

"Yeah? Where are you going with this?" MK asked, narrowing his eyes at his mentor in suspicion.

"Well, why don't you just let it live with you?" Wukong asked, and Macaque went still. "I mean, how do you know that it's been eating okay? You should probably get some food for it and all that."

Macaque was right, he hated this idea.

At least MK wouldn't agree to it, he did live above a restaurant after all, it probably wouldn't be a good idea to keep a cat around.

Or at least, that's what Macaque had thought, before he watched with growing horror as MK actually pondered the idea, before eventually-

"Y'know what, that's not that bad of an idea." MK said, and Macaque felt pure terror in his veins.

Within a few hours, Macaque found himself with a rather difficult choice to make.

Option one, admit that he was, in fact, not actually a cat. Change back to his normal self, face whatever consequences would definitely come, and then leave.

His other option, was to suck it up and eat the cat food MK had just placed in front of him.

For a few minutes, Macaque just sat there, switching between staring down at the cat food, and staring up at MK's innocent smile.

(Wukong had long since left, a fact that Macaque was very grateful for. He'd rather not have Wukong witness him being treated like an actual cat while full well knowing that he was not.

That said though, the look Wukong had given him as he left did not promise good things.)

Back to the point, the cat food.

If Macaque was being honest (for once), he absolutely did not want to go with the option of eating the cat food.

But....

If he revealed himself, what then? Would he get attacked? Kicked out?

Well, it's not like he had actually been staying here to begin with, but just kinda hanging around was.....nice, almost.

He wasn't so sure he was ready to lose it. (And wasn't that a thought he would have to unpack later....)

Decision made, he leaned over and nibbled a little bit of the cat food.

And almost immediately spat it back out again. Fuck, that was horrible, how could cats actually eat that stuff-

"What's the matter, is your sense of taste too refined for this?" MK asked, and Macaque looked up, seeing the smile on his face and how he was barely holding back laughter, amusement twinkling in his eyes and- oh.

Oh that little shi-

Glaring, Macaque stood up, shapeshifting back to normal.

"You." He said, threateningly pointing at MK. "You've known all along, haven't you."

That seemed to be MK's last straw, as he broke into laughter, leaning up against the counter to keep himself from collapsing completely as he folded over in mirth. (And oh, now Macaque was really glad Wukong had left, he thinks he'd actually die if the other monkey had witnessed all of this.)

"Yeah yeah, laugh it up." Macaque said, crossing his arms and tapping his foot on the floor, his tail lashing back and forth in irritation. "Y'know, I did not expect you to be the kind of person to play the long con."

"And I didn't expect you to be the kind of person that eats cat food!" MK wheezed.

Macaque, seeing no better response, hissed at him, and MK fell to the ground in hysterics.

"So was that time with the laser pointer just you getting super into your role of being a cat or-"

"Kid, if you don't forget that happened right now, I will personally introduce you to the concept of amnesia."

#Monkie Kid #fanfic #my writing #Winter accidentally spoiled a bit of the plot for this yesterday #cause we are nothing if not a hivemind i guess #but anyways; i hope you enjoy this!!

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hookingminor · 4 years

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three lessons - mat barzal

a/n: new series idea I just had, spoiler there is filth and the next parts will be as well also im not the best at writing smut so you’ll have to bear with me here. anyway! let me know what you think! comments/thoughts are always appreciated! also, I know it briefly mentions being the younger sister of a teammate, but I know nothing about the isles so its literally just for plot purposes don’t expect much from that and this isn’t proofread sorry

word count: 4.2k

summary: you’re tired of being a virgin, so you hit up Mat to help you with your problem and strike a deal

warnings (18+): loss of virginity, smut

PART TWO

This was by far the worst idea you’ve ever had.

In your twenty-one years of life, you’ve never had a worse idea. Your initial plan was crazy in and of itself, but adding Mat to the mix? It’s like you were asking to get your ass kicked.

The original thought came to you a year ago when you were sitting on the couch of your friend’s apartment, four glasses of wine into the night. She was complaining about her latest hookup, raging over the fact that he didn’t know where the clit was.

This is how it usually went between you two.

She was the one who got all the guys, the one who could pick up anyone from the bar and spend the night in a stranger’s bed without a second thought. You, however, were the wingwoman, the person who was left behind when your friend eventually decided to leave with a man.

It didn’t bother you that much. It’s not like you felt like you needed a boyfriend, you were secure in almost all aspects of your life, but the nagging thought in the back of your mind kept saying that you needed to get fucked. And soon.

Maybe it was the alcohol coursing through your bloodstream or the fact that you hadn’t masturbated in nearly two weeks, but you rolled your eyes at your friend before you finally snapped.

“At least you’ve had someone to fuck the past few months! Be grateful you’re not me and still a virgin at twenty!” You shouted, fed up with hearing stories about how your friend’s sex life was so terrible. At least she had a sex life to begin with.

“Oh my god. I’m so sorry,” you apologized quickly, bringing your hand to cover your mouth in shock, “I didn’t mean that. I’m sorry, it’s just… it’s hard listening to you talk about this when I can’t contribute to the conversation.”

“No, you’re right. I’m sorry for always talking about it,” your friend said, eyes softening when she heard how regretful you sounded, “How about we change the subject?”

She didn’t wait for your response before launching into a monologue about how classes were going and her upcoming finals. You tried listening to her, but your mind was still stuck on the previous topic. Of course it was unfortunate that you happened to be twenty and with no sexual experience, but it didn’t bother you before like it was bothering you right now.

Ideas began racing through your head of how you could rectify this, and that’s when the seed was planted.

Now, almost a year later, your carefully thought out plan was almost complete; though, ‘carefully’ could be more loosely translated to ‘reckless.’

You paced outside of Mat’s door, walking back and forth as you fiddled with your hands, working up the courage to knock. This was such a bad idea. You brought your hand up to the door, pausing before your fist made contact before bringing it back down and resuming your pacing.

After another five minutes of deep contemplation, you made your decision. You knocked on the door before you could second guess yourself, now bringing your hands to tug at the strands of your hair.

The few seconds it took for Mat to answer the door felt like a lifetime, and when he opened the door, you were met with a confused look.

“Y/N? What are you doing here?” He asked, peeking his head out of the door to glance down the hallway.

“Hi, I know you weren’t expecting me and you have to leave for practice soon, but I needed to talk to you about something,” you explained quickly.

Mat’s brows stayed furrowed in confusion, but he opened the door further to let you inside.

“Firstly, I just wanted to say that Anders doesn’t know I’m here, and I’d really appreciate it if you never mentioned it to him,” you said as he closed the door behind you.

Mat ushered you into his living room, gesturing for you to take a seat on the couch as he crossed his arms and waited for you to continue.

“This is going to sound absolutely crazy and you’re probably going to reject me but just hear me out,” you said, taking a deep sigh. He was totally going to shut you down, but there was no turning back now.

“I wanted to ask you if you’d have sex with me. You’d be doing me a favor as my friend. I’m kind of… a virgin… and I really don’t want to be anymore,” you took a breath to watch his reaction which was unreadable, “You’re probably thinking it’s a terrible idea, being that I’m Anders’s sister and everything, but I promise I won’t say anything to him. I just want to get a little experience under my belt… it’s kind of embarrassing. Anyway, I just wanted to ask if you’d give me a few lessons or something.”

You raised your eyes to meet Mat’s as you finished your rant, worrying about what he was going to say. A long silence fell between you two as he processed what you said.

“Uh… I don’t really know what to say,” he started awkwardly, bringing his hand to rub at the back of his neck, “I’m honored, I guess? That you asked me to help, but I’m just a little confused since we don’t really know each other.”

Okay, you could give him that. It was true that you weren’t the closest of friends, but you’d met on a handful occasions. It’s not like you were complete strangers, but other than knowing what you were studying in school and that you were Anders’s much younger sister, he didn’t know much about you.

“That’s fair,” you said, “I asked you because, well, you’re obviously hot which I’m sure you know. Also, not knowing each other is what makes this perfect. I’m not attached to you in any way and vice versa. Honestly? You’re one of the few guys in town that I feel comfortable around, so it was either ask you or find a random Tinder hookup and have to do this speech all over again but ten times as awkward.”

Mat didn’t like the last part of that explanation: the whole ‘random Tinder hookup to take your virginity’ part. He may not have known you that well, but he knew you were a nice girl and deserved to be more than just a notch on the bedpost of someone who didn’t care about you.

“I know you’re probably thinking I’m insane, and I get it. I felt a little insane when I thought about this too. But I really feel like you’re the best option. I understand if you think it’s too weird, though,” you said when he hadn’t replied. Your eyes watched him as he sat still as a rock across from you.

“I… I have to leave for practice soon,” was the only thing he responded with.

You felt your heart drop at his statement. Of course he was going to say no, you were an idiot for even trying.

“Yeah, totally, I’ll get going,” you said quickly, gathering your stuff and making your way to the entrance.

When you reached the door, you turned back one last time to see him still in the same position.

“Can you not tell Anders, please? I know this was a crazy, stupid idea but… just don’t tell him, okay? He doesn’t need to know about my sex… well, lack of sex life,” you added before shutting the door behind you.

Mat had lost his mind.

Truly and honestly, he had lost his mind if he was even considering your proposition. Which he was. He was really considering your proposition, and he wanted to punch himself for it.

He couldn’t possibly agree to this, could he? You were the captain’s younger sister. Sure, you two weren’t the closest of siblings, but the code still applied. And the code clearly said he was not allowed to fraternize with relatives of his teammates in any way. He hadn’t broken this rule yet, and he couldn’t believe he was even thinking about breaking it now.

Inside his head, he weighed the pros and the cons of sleeping with you. Well, teaching you would be a better phrase. If Mat was being honest, he had blacked out after the terms ‘virgin’ and ‘have sex with me’ fell from your lips. He watched you from his spot on the couch, his eyes following your mouth but not processing the words you were saying. Truthfully, he ran over the conversation a million times in his head and he wasn’t sure he was actually processing them now.

You wanted him to take your virginity. You wanted him to give you experience. You called them lessons.

You were, quite literally, asking him to be your sex tutor.

When you left the apartment, he did what he did best. He compartmentalized. Instead of thinking about the awkward conversation he just had with you, he pushed all thoughts of you from his mind and went to practice. For a whole three hours he focused on hockey. He even had the courage to look at his captain despite the weird interaction he’d just had with his sister.

But then practice was over, and Mat was left with nothing to do but think about what you said. Thinking turned into contemplating, and contemplating eventually turned into pulling up your Instagram page.

Mat typed and retyped the message a million times, deleting it before he could accidentally pressed send. He went back and forth between wanting to say yes and throwing his phone as far away from him so he wouldn’t be tempted.

What could be the worst thing that happened? He thought.

A million bad things could happen. He knew this deep in his heart that it was, for all intents and purposes, the worst idea ever to teach his captain’s sister how to have sex, but his head and desire to get laid had other plans.

So, he picked up his phone one last time and composed the same message he’d written a hundred times.

to @yourusername: does your offer still stand? text me 212-203-3849

For the second time in a week, you were pacing outside of Mat’s apartment. You’d received his message almost six days ago, and now here you were.

Your chest nearly collapsed with relief when you’d seen he wanted to take you up on your offer. And then your stomach filled with butterflies, nerves wracking your body as you now had an official plan to lose your virginity.

You eagerly liked the message, dialing his number in your phone so you could hash out the details over text. He promised you two would go over some ground rules in person, saying it felt too weird to have a written contract or something over text. You agreed to his plans and set a date to go over to his apartment that following weekend.

Feeling more courageous than you did a week ago, you knocked on the door with confidence this time. If you were going to lose your virginity tonight, you weren’t going to look like a frightened kitten when you did.

Mat greeted you with a warm smile this time, his eyes lighting up when he saw you. Same as last time, he ushered you into his apartment and directed you towards his couch.

“Do you want anything to drink? I was about to open a bottle of wine,” Mat asked, already moving to the kitchen.

“Yeah, wine would be great. Thanks,” you replied, taking a seat on the edge of the couch.

Mat tinkered around in the kitchen for a couple minutes before he joined you, handing you a glass of red. You took a long sip as he settled down, hoping the wine would work fast to calm your nerves.

“So, what did you want to discuss first?” He asked after a moment.

“Well, we should probably have some ground rules. I was thinking that since you’re the expert and all, you should decide how these lessons go. Oh, and I think that we should keep this to a three-time thing. Anything more than that will probably get more complicated,” you answered with ease. Not to say you had spent the past week thinking about what you were going to say, but you definitely did.

Mat nodded in agreement at your suggestions before adding his own.

“Yeah, that sounds good. Also, we can’t tell anyone about this because, you know, your brother and the team and all,” he said. You hummed in response, that much was a given. No one could know about this.

“So, where do we start? Should I take off my clothes or?” You asked.

“No,” he said with a chuckle, “We’re going to watch a movie.”

“That’s it?”

“That’s it. For now at least.”

You hadn’t known what you were expecting, but it was not a cuddle session on his couch. You imagined that maybe he would’ve just ripped your clothes off the minute you walked in to get down to business, but he was being way more casual than you were feeling. Which was probably a good thing because your heart was beating a thousand beats a minute, so at least one of you had this situation under control.

Mat had told you to dress comfortably as he didn’t plan on leaving the apartment, and he was dressed in a similar fashion as you: gray sweatpants with a dark blue t-shirt. You had thrown on a pair of leggings and a shirt from your college before leaving, making sure to wear at least a nice bralette and pair of panties underneath.

He drank down the rest of his wine before adjusting himself on the couch, moving into a position where he was laying down. Grabbing the blanket folded on the back cushion, he spread it out over his body before patting the spot in front of him. Normally, you would’ve been intimidated by a bold move like this, but the wide smile on his face indicated that he was perfectly comfortable right now, and his ease surrounded you in waves.

Slamming back the rest of your wine, you lay down in front of him, tucking your body against his while his arms pulled your chest closer.

“Anything specific you want to watch?” He asked, using his free hand to grab the remote. You muttered a quiet ‘no,’ allowing him to go ahead and choose. Mat scrolled through the Netflix options before settling on a new action movie.

“So, how much experience do you have exactly?” Mat asked once the introduction credits had finished. It was a good thing he wasn’t looking at you because your face heated up in embarrassment.

“I’ve only ever got as far as making out,” you muttered.

“No one’s ever touched you then?” He prodded.

“No,” you replied, your cheeks on fire. You couldn’t see him, but Mat nodded in response against the back of your head, letting out a quiet ‘okay.’

It wasn’t the first time Mat had been with a virgin, but that hadn’t been since high school and when he also wasn’t that experienced himself. Mat decided to let the movie play for a little bit longer before making his first move.

That time came when there was a particularly slow scene on. Slowly, he lifted up the hem of your t-shirt and slid his hand underneath, tracing small circles on the skin of your stomach. You clenched your thighs together as a warm feeling started to spread throughout your body.

It was happening.

Mat kept his hands there for a few minutes, inching up so slowly you almost couldn’t tell he’d moved at all. When the initial shock of his touch settled, you tried to refocus your attention to the movie.

Another ten minutes passed before Mat made his next move. Almost imperceptibly, he used his elbow to push his torso up before he brushed the hair covering your neck to the side. You felt his fingertips brush your ear, a shiver running up your spine. He brought his lips to your neck a split second later, placing a soft kiss against it.

Your eyes briefly shut for a second, reveling in the fact that Mat’s lips were on your neck. He kissed around your jaw a couple times before the hand on his stomach was shifting you to rest on your back. Your body followed his lead and your eyes met his hazel ones before he was leaning in to kiss your lips.

A heat unfurled in your body the second your lips connected and you eagerly moved yours against his. One of Mat’s hands had moved to the back of your neck to tilt your head at a better angle, the other hand moving further up under your shirt to rest just below your bra clasp. Your body involuntarily arched up into his hands as his tongue slipped out to part your lips. You opened your mouth and his tongue entered immediately, tangling with yours. You and Mat lay on the couch for a good while, making out heavily before you eventually had to break it for air.

“At least you don’t have to worry about kissing. You’re a natural,” Mat commended with an airy chuckle, and you couldn’t help but laugh at his compliment.

Mat’s smile brightened at your laugh before he leaned back in, the heat building in your body at double speed. You knew you were attracted to him, but you didn’t think he would be able to wind you up this fast. Or maybe it was just because you’ve never had a man touch you like this before.

Breaking the kiss, Mat began to trail more kisses down your body, pausing near your collarbone when he heard a particular breathy gasp leave your mouth. Mat continued his path over your shirt until he reached your belly button.

“Can I take this off?” He asked, looking up at you.

“You can take mine off if you take yours off,” you replied with a seductive smirk. Mat pulled back from your body, matching your smirk with one of his own as he tore off his shirt. Less than a second later, he was tugging at the hem of yours, urging you to sit up so he could take it off.

Mat’s hands were back on your body right after he tossed your shirt on the floor. This time, he retraced his path down your torso with his mouth and tongue, leaving no patch of skin untouched. His fingers danced around the edge of your leggings, teasing you until you were lifting up your hips into his face.

“Please take them off, Mat,” you said through gasps, wanting nothing more than to be rid of your clothing. He chuckled lightly against your waistband, his nose tickling your abdomen before he began shimmying off your leggings.

Tilting your hips up, you helped him slide the pants down your legs along with your underwear. Though your cheeks flamed up at the thought of being exposed before Mat, you felt oddly calm (well, as calm as you can be given the circumstances) with him.

“Holy shit, baby. You’re soaked,” Mat noted with a deep groan. He shuffled his body further down the couch into a comfortable position, lifting one leg to hook over his shoulder.

You breathed in shaky breaths as Mat placed gentle kisses on your thighs, working upwards slowly until he reached your core. And when he used his tongue to lick a strip across your pussy, your back arched into the air as you let out a loud moan.

“You gotta stay still, Y/N,” Mat chuckled darkly, wrapping one hand to steady your middle.

“Sorry, never done this before,” you replied in gasps.

Now immobilized, Mat resumed his place between your legs, repeating the same series of licks before he closed his lips around your clit. He flicked his tongue across the sensitive area. God, you would have done this a long time ago if you knew it would feel this good. You weren’t sure if it was too early to feel the heat inside you build up this quickly or if Mat was just too good at this. You hoped it was the latter.

His tongue lapped at your folds, and your hands flew down to grasp his hair in need. You didn’t think you could moan any louder, but then he brought his thumb to your clit to rub in tight circles as his tongue teased your entrance.

“Holy fuck,” you whined out, canting your hips up as much as you could. You could feel his smirk against your pussy at your exclamation, bringing his hand down to slowly enter a finger into you.

You let out a surprised gasp as you felt the first finger penetrate you. Mat kept his attention on your clit, lips sucking harshly at it. You let yourself get lost in the pleasure, focusing on how good he was making you feel.

After a few thrusts of one finger, giving you plenty of time to adjust, he added a second, feeling your walls tighten around them. He moved both fingers in and out of you, alternating the pressure between your entrance and clit. Just when he hit the right spot inside you, your hand tugged on his hair tightly, and he took the hint to curl his fingers against that spot.

“I’m so close, Mat,” you moaned, tossing your head back into the pillow.

“What do you need, baby?” He asked, pulling back for a quick breath. You glanced down to meet his gaze, taking in the way his chin glistened from your pussy. The view made you moan lowly, and his eyes darkened at the sound.

“Your tongue, please,” you begged quietly.

Mat heard the words leave your mouth and nestled his face back between your legs, tongue sliding up your slit in response. In rhythm with stroking your g-spot, he sucked at your clit, and it was mere seconds before your body coiled tightly inside. He kept the same pace and before long, you felt yourself crest the peak and then fall.

Mat removed his fingers slowly from your entrance, his tongue licking softly at your folds until he felt your breathing return to normal. It took you a few seconds to regain your sense of self, stars still whirling in the corners of your vision. When you finally felt yourself grounded on Earth again, you opened your eyes to see a self-satisfied smirk on Mat’s face.

“You’re so hot when you come,” he said when you met his gaze, and had you not been riding high on cloud nine when he said this, you might have blushed in embarrassment. But you weren’t embarrassed right now. The only thing you felt was giddy. Giddy because you were one step closer to your end goal.

And while you were blissed out, you dropped your gaze to notice the extremely visible bulge tenting in his sweatpants. Focused on a new task, you sat up quickly before leaning over Mat’s body so you could return the favor. Your lips crashed against his in a frenzy, your hands clumsily reaching down to grasp his length. However, you only got to feel it for a second before Mat’s hand was tugging it away.

“Not tonight, babe. Tonight was about you,” Mat said with a strained voice, breaking the kiss to look at you.

“What do you mean? We’re not having sex tonight?” You asked in confusion, your head still a little hazy from the orgasm.

“No, we’re not,” he laughed, noticing the wantonness in your voice, “You said I’m in charge, right? This was already a lot for one night, so we’ll put off the sex until next time.”

You nodded your head, though you weren’t really understanding. It made sense. Tonight was a very big step for you, and he didn’t want to give you too much at once. But despite that, your pussy was begging for a repeat performance and you were so far gone you were willing to do just about anything Mat would say.

“What about you, though?” You asked, glancing down to the noticeable tent.

“I’ll be fine, I promise. We still have two more lessons. There’s plenty of time for that later,” he replied, though the bulge between you seemed to say otherwise.

“Promise you’re okay?” You insisted.

“I swear, Y/N,” he said with a chuckle.

A comfortable silence fell between you after that, and you couldn’t help the wide smile that spread across your face. Your eyes sparkled with renewed purpose, and you felt satisfied for the first time in a long time. A smile of Mat’s own slowly appeared on his face as he watched you light up before him. Before you could stop yourself, you threw yourself into him, wrapping your arms tightly around his neck.

“Thank you, Mat. Thank you, thank you, thank you,” You said happily, punctuating each ‘thank you’ with a loud smacking kiss on his cheek.

When you pulled back to give him that award-winning smile again, Mat had one thought.

He was totally fucked.

#mat barzal #nhl imagines #hockey imagines #nhl smut #mat barzal imagine #my writing #isles13

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vs-redemption · 3 years

Note

I though of another thing lmao. I play a lot of video games too lol

But Dabi x Healer!Reader

(I was thinking of mercy from ow so reader has the ability to heal and damage boost her allies and revive them from the dead. - I would say to nerf that for the story it would depend on how long and how they died) - 🐱❤️

From Cindy: 🐱anon! I love you and miss you!! I’m sorry it took so long to get to this! I’ve been a busy bee recently and have had some writers block but I’m feeling very refreshed now! I had fun writing about our favorite burnt villain boy, and I hope you like how this turned out! ❤️ ❤️

Partners (Dabi x GN!Reader)

Dabi was not ashamed to admit that his only reason for recruiting you into the league of villains was to use you for your quirk. It seemed like your powers had almost been designed specifically to support his goals and make up for his weaknesses. His intense blue flames caused severe damage to his body, but your healing touch could fully recover him in an instant. And anything in his path that could somehow withstand the heat of his flames would be burnt to ash instantly with a simple boost from your quirk. You were the perfect tool, and he had fully planned on capitalizing on that.

“I trust you to find people to support our cause,” Shigaraki had told him in the beginning, “but don’t you think this person is just going to be a liability in a fight?”

It was a concern he and Dabi had shared and was the biggest drawback to allowing you to join the team. You couldn’t defend yourself and would need to rely on the other villains to keep you safe whenever things got dangerous. If there was anything Dabi hated more than anything, it was pretending to care about other people. It was bad enough he had to stomach Shigaraki and the others, but at least he could trust them to hold their own in a battle. In exchange for your incredible abilities, you were going to be a constant thorn in his side. However, the pros outweighed the cons and he ultimately ended up agreeing to let you join.

At first, he thought he might’ve made a big mistake. You got along a little too well with the others, and ideally he wanted you to prioritize him over everyone else. Unfortunately, he was awful at faking interest and carrying conversations about anything that wasn’t related to himself, so building any sort of connection with you felt basically impossible. After some thought, he decided to keep his distance as much as possible unless interaction was absolutely necessary. As long as you remembered why he’d recruited you in the first place, and used your quirk the way he’d intended, he’d be satisfied.

Dabi was very familiar with rage. It was the emotion that had kept him constant company since he was a small child, and the emotion that fueled and motivated him whenever things got too painful or difficult. However, as familiar as he was with rage, he’d never learned how to control it when something triggered an outburst. So, when you refused to give his flames a boost during a particularly intense showdown with the heroes, he’d gone completely ballistic. Even without your powers, the intensity of his quirk has been magnified causing his flames to go wild. The anger had consumed him so completely that not even a direct order from Shigaraki had been able to stop him from unleashing the waves and waves of blue fire. The heat was so overbearing that both the heroes and villains had been forced to retreat.

Back at the hideout, you did your best to keep Shigaraki calm while you tended to the wounds incurred during the fight, including some nasty burns on Twice’s arms from when he’d tried to approach Dabi and reason with him. The fire wielder in question had not returned to the base with the others, choosing to continue on the warpath until someone managed to stop him or he wore himself out. He was surprised when it was you who came back out a few hours later to retrieve him from the dark alley way he’d hidden himself away in. Despite his exhaustion and the excruciating pain all over his entire body, he went right back on the defensive as soon as he saw your face.

“You must have a death wish!” His says through a grimace. A ball of fire appears in his hand threatening, but you could see the steam coming off of his skin from how much he’d overused his quirk already.

“From where I’m standing, I’d say it’s you with the death wish,” you frown. “How much longer do you think your body can hold out if you continue like this?”

“That’s none of your business!” Dabi snaps and takes a shaking step forward. “I only allowed you to join our cause so that you could support us in fights.”

“And I will lend you my support when it is beneficial to the cause,” you fold your arms and fix him with a hard glare. “The league needs you. But look at how your raw power affects your body on its own. If I boosted your quirk, you’d be a pile of ash and bones in an instant.”

“That’s not your call to make,” Dabi growls before his flame sputters out and he stumbles forward. You put your arms out instinctively to catch him, but the heat coming from his skin is painful to the touch. You help him to the ground as gently as you can and carefully start to heal his wounds. Thankfully he doesn’t protest.

“It is my call to make if it affects me,” you argue as you hover your hands over his skin. “My quirk has limits just like anybody else’s. Do you really expect me to help you destroy yourself knowing it’s going to be my responsibility to fix you again afterwards?”

Dabi hoped that was a hypothetical question. What he expected was for you to do whatever he asked, whether it put physical strain on you or not. He did understand your thought process though. His quirk was both a blessing and a curse, and the level of his power was closely tied to the intensity of his emotions. It was definitely possible that a boost to his flames could push him a little too far.

“You know,” you plop down next to him on the dirty ground once you finish doing what you can for his burns, tired from exerting yourself more than usual that day. “Maybe instead of testing the limits of your mortality, you could just try relying on your allies instead.” You glance over at him to see a scowl take over his features, and when he finally turns to meet your gaze you simply smile. “Even if you only put your trust in one single person, you might find that accomplishing your goals becomes far easier. I’m sure you’re not the only one in our group with ulterior motives, so working with someone rather than against could be mutually beneficial.”

Trust was not something Dabi had much experience with. He wasn’t sure he could trust another person, and it probably wasn’t safe for other people to trust him either. Still though, an under the table partnership might not be a bad idea, and was part of his original plan for you anyway. He wasn’t a fan of compromises, and you didn’t seem like the type to be easily bullied into compliance, but having someone working with him specifically rather than indirectly through Shigaraki might prove useful. And if things didn’t work out, he could always ditch you later. Or perhaps you were even more perfectly matched with him than he originally thought. In which case, it might be possible for him to learn how to do that pesky ‘trust’ thing. Only time would tell.

#🐱 anon #Dabi x reader #mha x reader #bnha x reader #Dabi #bnha dabi #bnha #mha #Cindy's Writing

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codevassie · 3 years

Text

Superpower TS Fic Recs

[***Let me know if I’ve missed anything on the Content Warnings!]

[**Do Not Ask Authors for Updates!]

[*Leave these authors Comments, please and thank you!]

What You Can Stand by manyfandomsonelog

Status: Incomplete, Work In Progress

Summary: Virgil tried so, so hard to avoid becoming a supervillain. He really did. But when your superpower is literally manifesting a person's worst fears, it's a hard thing to avoid. Still, he really, really tried. Even when his own parents feared him. Even when the whole school feared him. Even when he hated himself and his Propensity so much that he wanted to give in. He might've succeeded, if he hadn't met him- Roman Reyes, AKA Roman Spectacular, AKA The Prince, AKA the worst thing that has ever happened to him (which is saying something).

Relationships: Prinxiety, Logicality

CW: Psychological stuff, nightmares, bullying, physical harm, spiders, panic attacks, suicidal thoughts, brief discussion of racism, self-hatred, bomb, explosion, blood, injury, bad/abusive parenting, imprisonment, fire, homophobia, pedophilia mention, discussion of child abuse, evidence of physical abuse, sexual innuendo, anxious thoughts, death, funeral, flashback, reference to sex, fairly aggressive arguing and yelling, public speaking, secondhand embarrassment

My thoughts: My quarantine savior!!! I started the fic like a week into quarantine, so I really mean that literally. The characterization is absolutely fantastic--I love seeing all of them interact. It’s so natural and fun and interesting. The plot is also just wonderful--one thing keeps happening after another and these guys just cannot seem to get a break. The pacing is awesome, and whether it’s a character or plot chapter, you just can’t look away. Log is such a fantastic writer and a wonderful person, so if you like awesome prinxiety, superpowers and secret identities, trust and betrayal, humor and angst, you really need to read this one!

Rewind by ravenclawicecream

Status: Incomplete, Work In Progress

Summary: When a group of superheroes show up to kill him, it's just another Wednesday for Virgil Messana. After five years of being on the run, he's used to the idea people want him dead. That fact is just an unfortunate side effect of having the power to destroy everything you touch. What does surprise him, however, is when he finds himself agreeing to join those superheros and become part of the team. It's not long until Virgil learns that all the heroes have chapters of their lives they'd rather keep unpublished, along with events they'd rather not relive. And, as he spends more time with the team, he realizes that he may know certain members much better than he'd originally thought. Virgil longs for a moment to figure everything out but by then it's too late. He's already caught up in a bigger scheme; one where they no longer have the power to control their own destinies. With every movement monitored and every action proven to be calculated, the lines between allies and enemies blur, leaving Virgil caught in between. When the stakes are inevitably raised, the remaining heroes must do all they can to change the future of the world. But time has always been a cruel master, and sometimes the only answer is to rewind.

Relationships: Loceit, Logicality, Prinxiety, Remile

CW: Major Character Death, Murder

My thoughts: Gosh, I wish this one got more love. It’s probably the MCD tag, so understandable, but also take into consideration the time travel tag and perhaps give it a chance? I feel like this fic is setting up for so much, and I cannot wait to see how it all goes down. I have so many questions for this fic which is always a good sign (so many that I may have freaked the author out with my WALL of questions on chapter three don’t worry about it /j). Please. Read. This.

Powerless by patentpending

Status: Complete

Summary: “People like us,” Logan had once remarked to Virgil. “Are statistical anomalies.”(Almost) Everyone in the world has powers. As for those who don’t, well, they’re such a small part of the population - only 0.04% - why would anyone care about them?Ever since he realized what people mean when they call him Powerless, Virgil Sanders has tried to fight back against the system that oppresses people like him, Patton, and Logan. When Patton’s bakery is targeted in a hate crime, he finally snaps. With the help of a mysterious sponsor, Virgil becomes a villain, ready to remake a broken society. The only thing standing in his way is the world’s most Powerful (and infuriatingly charming) superhero: The Prince, who is hiding the fact that his gilded life isn’t as perfect as it may seem.

Relationships: Prinxiety, Logicality, Roman/Female Fanon Character

CW: Classism, Unreliable Narrator, Thinly Veiled Criticism of Society, emetophobia, violence, gun mention, implied suicide attempt, dub-con, mentions of blood, graphic depictions of a riot, non-graphic description of a wound, possessive and abusive behavior, kid being kicked out of the house by parent, kidnapping, kinda torture (?), body horror, gore, graphic descriptions of injuries, emotional abuse, police brutality, pain and injury, burning building, swearing, vomiting, murder, panic attack, dysphoria, misgendering, minor character death, major character death, self deprecating talk, mentions of suicide

My thoughts: Well, doing a TS superhero rec without Powerless is just treason. I don’t know--I’m trying to figure out a way to describe it and instead launching up to pace around the room with an instant replay of different scenes in my head. I mean, the grocery store chapter?!?! This stuff lives in my head rent free. The characterization, the banter, the tension, the motives--I can’t describe it y’all. Just, if you love yourselves (love yourselves, please <3) then just go read it. Or reread it. Do that for yourselves.

Waterspout by Greenninjagal

Status: Complete

Summary: "Hail!” The boy says all smug smiles that Virgil immediately hates. “You’re Recluse aren’t you?”As if there was some other spider themed weirdo who clung to buildings in their free time.“No,” Virgil says, because he can. *** Virgil finds himself stuck on the side of a building in a rainstorm and is helped by an annoying-admittedly attractive-guy.

Relationships: Prinxiety

CW: Mild cursing, storms

My thoughts: This one is very cute. Virgil is a spiderman-like hero who went up a waterspout, and down comes some rain trying to wash him out. Roman comes to help, they banter a bit, and, maybe, there’s a little surprise at the end. I would not mind more of this AU. In fact, I would love it. But that should not discount how wonderfully made a oneshot it is either. The author wrote it perfectly for the length it is, presenting the charm of the characters, great plot and symbolism, and left me wanting more at the same time. Definitely go check this one out.

Technically. It’s A Secret by supervillain

Status: Incomplete, Work In Progress

Summary: Virgil Storm, the adopted son of a reality TV star with telekinesis was born without a power. That's been a problem for him all his life. His only friend is Patton Vega, his only chance at romance the irritating Cros Corson--until he gets a job at a top-secret facility, playing babysitter to a bunch of kids with dangerous powers and even more dangerous minds. Kids who happen to be exactly his age.Yeah, this is going to be a piece of cake, especially when the enigmatic villain Believe (aka Roman Torres) takes a liking to Virgil. And even worse, when Virgil starts to more than like him back. Pull in some evil mad scientists, a plague created to decimate the world, a murderous villain, an obnoxious stalker, and the greatest Kinetic the world has ever known, and you're in for a hell of a ride.

Relationships: Prinxiety, Logicality

CW: Anxiety attacks, arson, murder, minor character death, blood, spiders, being eaten alive, falling, death, sleeping, fighting, cop mention

My thoughts: I’m behind on this one, and I wanted to catch up on it before I posted this rec list. Today is the last Friday of the year though, so I decided to just go ahead and do it. I love this fic a ton so far, and I can’t wait to read more. I can tell the author put a lot of thought into writing the world and characters, and that the plot is interesting and deliberate. There’s mysteries unfolding which intrigues me So Bad. It’s a super interesting one, so I’d say go read it!

#fic recs #sanders sides #ts #friday fic recs #prinxiety #NOTE: the two that have a wall of CWs are mostly just warnings from the beginnings of chapters #which means they can be skipped over fairly easily #so today is the last friday of the year (holy snit) so i wanted to get this out #i've been trying to make this list since like may but i don't read a whole lot of superpower aus #hope everyone is having a great one!

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lov3nerdstuff · 4 years

Text

How long is forever?

*Tom Hiddleston x reader*

Parts: Oneshot

Words: 4.2k

Genre: flufffff

Imagine: You catch Tom's interest at Comic Con

Request: by @my-mind-was-lostintranslation I rly hope this is something you will enjoy 💗 I just never end up writing requests the obvious way 😂

______________________________

You had been reluctant about agreeing to come along. Reluctant about the entire idea of going to Comic Con, about buying tickets for way too much money, about your somewhat-friends wanting to randomly crash with some people they would surely meet instead of getting an overpriced hotel, about your one friend making you wear this skimpy green Loki dress because she thought it would go along nicely with your tattoos and skin color. And still, some demon had planted the seed of hope in your brain and thus you found yourself coming along, hoping to meet the only person at this convention you actually found any interest in. Tom Hiddleston.

You were dressed as one of his characters after all, even if not entirely by choice. Sure, you had seen his movies and shows and enjoyed his acting quite the deal, but what truly fascinated you about him was his own person. His character and opinions, smart thoughts and deep questions. He just seemed like a person you would love to get to know, for surely he was more interesting than any of your other acquaintances (maybe even than the friends you were here with… it was more of a community of purpose than a real friendship after all). And listening to Tom's panel was probably the closest you would get to spending time with a kindred mind.

Unfortunately your friends were more the anime and manga kind of people, definitely more than you were at least, and thus you found yourself going to Tom's panel alone. You weren't one of those girls who would sell their soul to sit in the front, or to ask questions… no, you were content sitting in the middle of the room and just letting life happen around you.

As an artist yourself, you had originally been fairly interested in the artwork you would get to see here, but all too soon you had been severely disappointed by the few artists who had even bothered to come to a rather small con like this at all. That someone like Tom was present for the day bordered on a miracle, really, considering the size of the convention. Maybe he had been in the region for shooting whatever film he was currently working on?

As you sat in the middle of the audience room, waiting for the panel to start, you found yourself mesmerized by the lightning situation on stage. It hit the objects in such a way that they just begged you to be turned into art… and you didn't have anything else to do anyway. So, thinking that you maybe just should've gone to the museum instead of this convention, you dug a black pen out of your bag, along with a small blank paper notebook and started sketching with a content sigh.

Once the panel started, having someone else talk first before Tom would come on, you went on to also sketch the portrait of the panel's host and the first guest, for listening was just easier while drawing. And when finally the time had come, and Tom was greeted on stage with thundering applause, you found yourself smiling to yourself as you flipped the page of your notebook to start on a portrait finally worth drawing.

_______________

Tom was tired. Very tired indeed, as he had been urged to come to the convention impossibly early despite having spent most of the night traveling and doing interviews. And now he was to go out onto the stage and smile and chat with people while pretending not to fall asleep any minute. It had been easy enough to smile and say hi and bye in a sinus curve of repetition while signing pretty much whatever people had brought, but now he actually was supposed to talk some sense, and avoid spoilers, and preferably also do some subtle and appealing PR for his newest movie. However all he really wanted to do was to have a nice cup of tea and get some sleep. But this was work, and this wasn't even half as bad as his tired brain made it out to be. He liked talking to people, to fans and interviewers and host, after all and this surely would be fun.

So he really only had to fake a smile for the first three seconds as he walked onto stage, for he had to smile for real from then on. It was a smaller convention, but the room was packed nonetheless. He enjoyed the fact that he could actually see the audience for once, and not only a black pit of murmurs and occasional flashing lights. It made the whole thing way more pleasant, and as he shook hands with everyone and sat down, he actually felt comfortable and ready to have a nice chat.

He answered some questions about the movie he was working on, had a couple laughs with the host, and then some time to let his eyes wander through the audience while the other guest was being interviewed. It wasn't a habit, really, but he liked to count the number of character he recognized from people's costumes. It was a good way to check if his pop culture knowledge was severely lacking or only minorly lacking currently.

His eyes flew over the audience members quickly but intently, and he found himself smiling in excitement a couple times whenever he spotted someone dressed as Loki. But otherwise, the crowd wasn't unusual in any way, to his eyes… Until they fell upon a young woman in a green sleeveless dress, scribbling something into a journal. Her eyes moved from the stage to the book, back and forth, again and again, as her hand moved quicker than Tom could begin to follow. She had drawings, tattoos, on her shoulders and arms, but Tom couldn't really tell what they depicted nor if they were real or part of the costume. But he could tell that, as his eyes moved on over the audience, they were drawn back to her within seconds, again and again. He tried ignoring her, scanning the rest of the audience part by part, but it was of no use… his eyes would always revert back to the girl.

She was still drawing, or writing maybe… Tom couldn't tell. But the tiredness in his brain was washed away more and more the longer he watched her, inspecting both her actions and her appearance.

The dress probably was supposed to be a costume of some kind, but not a particularly good or detailed one… more of a jersey dress than a costume created with effort. Nothing that would cause his mind to cling onto her so much.

Suddenly every thought was stilled in the depth of his mind, as her eyes moved back to the stage and found his own. It had been merely accidental on both ends, he could tell by her surprised look, but now that their eyes had locked, Tom found himself unable to tear his gaze away. So did she, and they remained entirely focused on each other in complete stillness.

"Tom? You still with us, buddy?" The host's amused voice came crashing into Tom's muted mind and he almost jumped a little as his eyes left hers to look at his fellows on the stage. Gosh, he had completely forgotten that he was still very much on public display… no sleep wasn't too kind on his brain.

"I'm so sorry." Tom replied with an apologetic, breathless laugh. "What did you say again?"

For the next fifteen minutes, Tom answered the fans' questions. Ever so often, his eyes would flick back to the girl in the green dress for a mere second before coming back to the person he was actually speaking to. It wasn't very polite, he knew that, but he just couldn't stop himself, couldn't stop his mind from returning to her whenever chance allowed him. Unfortunately he didn't meet her eyes again, and the intriguing, time stopping experience from before remained a singularity.

Why couldn't she be asking him a question? Tom would've loved to speak to her, for whatever reason. Maybe just to hear her voice. Maybe to find out why he couldn't stop looking at her, wondering about her…

The questions that were asked, as usual, ranged from the boring things people could just have googled to the slightly more interesting things such as his favorite book quotes. But yet again, there was nothing all too interesting, nothing Tom really had to focus on too much. It was rare that people asked him things he actually needed to think about, but maybe that was due to the brief nature of the convention. Question, answer, next. In under a minute. Yes, maybe it was Tom himself who was too demanding in the things that would interest him. Still, he was grateful for everyone who bothered to come to his panel and to ask him a question, no matter how boring the question itself was. Just seeing the joy in people's faces when he answered them would be enough on most days to make him happy indeed.

But today, it wasn't enough. He found that while it did fill him with joy to see people being happy about his answers, he couldn't quite be content as long as he still hadn't spoken to the girl. At least hear her ask a question… since real conversation was so rare at con.

"I'm afraid we're running out of time." The host declared sadly, drawing Tom out of his thoughts. "That was the last question."

A loud round of disappointed 'ooh's from the audience made Tom smile ever so slightly, until his eyes met the girl's once more, causing his features to relax into neutral curiosity.

"Any last words, Tom?" The host asked dramatically, laughing at his own exaggeration.

"Actually…" Tom started, thinking that at least this once he would actually make use of him being a celebrity and thus having the ability to do a great deal of things that weren't planned and that would thereby cause chaos for other people. But he couldn't help it. "Actually, I would like to ask a question too."

"A question? To… to someone in the audience?" The host rose his eyebrows and Tom nodded, upon which the former continued. "Uhm, well, go ahead then. A question from Tom Hiddleston, everybody!"

People clapped and cheered for a moment and Tom turned in his chair to face the audience, to face the girl he was so keen on getting to know. Her eyes were back on the journal, jumping back back forth between the item in her lap and Tom on the stage.

"My question…" Tom started, heart picking up speed rapidly. What was he doing here…? Causing Luke problems, most likely. "My question is for the girl in the green dress who has been scribbling in her notebook for the entire duration of this panel. Twelfth row from the back, right in the middle."

The spotlight that had previously been fixed on the audience microphone moved over the crowd, until it halted right on the mysterious girl Tom meant to talk to. She looked up from her notebook immediately, looking around herself in mild panic first and then staring right back at Tom like a deer in the headlights.

Tom's stomach dropped, twisting in nervousness… he hadn't meant to make her uncomfortable, hadn't thought about putting her on display like that. Gosh, he really should've put more thought into this, he usually put way too much thought into everything… but now he had to follow through with it either way. What did he want to ask again…? Her eyes fixed on his had his heart skipping multiple beats and his mind fall silent for a moment… until he remembered that everyone was staring at him expectantly. He still hadn't come up with a question.

"Alright, my question for you is…" He paused very briefly, wondering how he could find out who she was with only one single question. But then again… maybe he only had to find out if getting to know her would be worth the trouble. "How long is forever?"

_______________

Murmuring erupted in the audience room around you, and your heart beat so fast that it almost jumped out of your ribcage. Was this really happening? Everyone was looking at you… some people were even filming the whole thing. And everyone was waiting for your answer. Great… How long was forever indeed? Right now, every moment that passed with Tom looking at you felt like an own eternity. That's when it clicked in your mind.

"Sometimes, just one second." You replied loud enough to be heard all the way to the front, actually pushing yourself to get over your nervousness. Easier said than done… you felt like fainting. Luckily you were sitting already, otherwise your knees just might have given in. And when Tom started smiling at you widely a second later, your insides turned into a mushy goo of nerves and excitement and tingles.

"Thank you." He said with the most adorable expression, and you bit your bottom lip to keep from grinning. Surely, you had noticed how he'd looked at you a couple times throughout the panel, but you had thought you'd imagined it. That he had looked at everyone that way.

But when your eyes had met, it had sent a bolt of liquid lightning through your veins, flooding your body with a new kind of excitement. Then he had gone on to say he meant to ask one single question to someone in the audience, and you had been sure it wouldn't be to you. Obviously you'd been wrong about that.

Almost in a haze, you observed how the host thanked Tom and the other guest for coming, before ushering both out of sight. The lights on stage went out, the ones in the audience room brightened, and people around you started to leave as if your heart hadn't just almost exploded.

Well, that certainly had been something. Didn't happen to you every day that people wanted to quote Alice in Wonderland with you, and even less that someone actually talked to you willingly, and still even less that this someone was a person you actually wanted to talk to as well. And yet even less that the person happened to be Tom Hiddleston. You closed your eyes for a moment to calm down.

Now that the adrenaline was slowly letting you breathe normally again, you flipped your notebook shut and stuffed it into your bag together with the pen, wondering why exactly he had asked YOU, out of all people, THIS question, out of all the things he could've asked. Your friends would never believe this.

Once you felt like you could actually walk again, you rose to your feet and made your way to the exit, only to be stopped by a hand on your shoulder.

With a frown you turned around, believing you might have lost something maybe, only to find a man in a suit standing in front of you. Your frown deepened.

"Excuse me, but you're the girl Tom asked that odd question, right?" He asked politely, withdrawing his hand from your shoulder the second you turned around.

"It wasn't an odd question, it was Alice's question to the white rabbit. But yeah, that was me." You replied before you could stop yourself from being a smartass, looking at the man curiously. He wore one of those badges that gave him access to the VIP and backstage areas… obviously he belonged to the staff. The suit alone was a poor indicator of that, after all… someone in a suit at Comic Con could also just be a man in black, or whatever incarnation of the doctor or anything really. His suit looked too expensive to be a costume though.

"Would you mind coming to the VIP area with me? Tom, that nut, begged me to do whatever it takes to get you over there and I really don't want to have him running around out here himself. Who knows what mischief he may cause..." The man sighed with a small smile and you felt your cheeks heating up. Tom wanted to talk to you. For real. What?!

"Uhm… Of course, I mean… sure?" You replied insecurely, and the man in the suit sighed in relief before walking ahead and motioning for you to follow. Three minutes later you had passed on into a different hall and ventured past a couple security guards, finally coming to an area that was completely closed off to the public. You felt only minorly nervous now, and mostly curious. Without a thousand people staring at you, it was way easier to think.

The man in the suit led you towards a group of people standing in a loose circle, talking and laughing. You actually recognized most of them from movies or TV shows as you quickly went over their faces, looking around until your eyes fell upon Tom. As he saw you approaching, his eyes lit up and he smiled in your direction.

"You owe me." The man in the suit said to Tom as you came to stand in front of him at last. "Don't do anything stupid."

"I would never!" Tom replied to him with a grin, upon which he rolled his eyes.

"I'm keeping an eye on you, Hiddleston." The man grinned back as he turned to leave again.

"That's what I'm paying you for!" Tom called after him, laughing and shaking his head to himself before finally looking at you with a small smile. "Hi."

"Hey." You replied, unable to keep from smiling yourself. "Did I answer correctly?"

"Oh, you did for sure. Don't worry."

"Good." You chuckled, looking to your feet for a second and then back at the man in front of you. Gosh, he really was too handsome for his own good.

"Am I making you nervous?" He asked reluctantly, giving you an almost concerned look.

"I'm not starstruck, if that's what you mean." You replied easily, actually not feeling nervous at all for once. "I'm just wondering why I'm here."

"Because I'm curious about you." Tom smiled, and you could swear that he was blushing a little bit. It looked rather adorable and your heart skipped a beat. "What's your name?"

"I'm Y/n." You replied lightly, taking in all the small details about him that you hadn't been able to see from the distance before.

"Y/n… that's a lovely name. I'm Tom."

"Yeah, I know." You laughed, biting your lip to keep from grinning too widely. Whether he was trying to make you relaxing by humor or if he really was just a dork, you found yourself to be comfortable with him.

"Of course you do…" He laughed too, looking down to the ground and shaking his head to himself. Oh, he was definitely blushing now, and it was freaking adorable.

"You observed me during the panel, didn't you?" You asked calmly, trying to ease his embarrassment a bit by changing the topic.

"I did indeed." He gave you an apologetic smile as he motioned for you to take a seat on the couch, before sitting down across from you. "I just couldn't help it."

"And here I was, thinking I'm making things up." You chuckled.

"What were you scribbling in that notebook the entire time? If you don't mind me asking..." He inquired curiously, eyes searching and finding yours. Somehow they held the power to stop time for you and leave you feeling completely mesmerized. Tom seemed to experience a similar thing, for he only kept looking at you while you looked back at him for a second bearing your own forever. Until someone dropped something on the concrete floor very loudly, making both of you jump.

"I… I was just sketching some random objects, some people…" You finally replied as you found your words again. "Nothing special."

"So you're an artist? Here at the convention?"

"Yes, and no. I am an artist, but not in a million years famous enough to be invited to con." You laughed, taking in the sincere interest in Tom's expression. It'd been such a long time since anybody had looked at you like that...

"May I take a look at today's work?" He asked with so much hope that there was no way you could've said no to him. Whatever it was he would ask of you.

So you handed him your journal, and he flipped the pages open at your bookmark. That would be the portrait you sketched of him.

"Wow, this is amazing…" He remarked, frowning as he focused entirely on the drawing for a moment. "You did this in, what, fifteen minutes?"

"Yup." You shrugged, feeling your cheeks heat up yet again. "I mean, you're too tempting not to draw."

Tom's eyes shot up from the page to meet yours as he pulled up one eyebrow and grinned at you, while you only now registered what you had said, closing your eyes and biting your lip in embarrassment.

"I just meant that with you as a sitter, every portrait would look good." You tried to make it sound right, only to find Tom still grinning at you in amusement.

"Every portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, not of the sitter. The sitter is merely the accident, the occasion. It is not he who is revealed by the painter; it is rather the painter who, on the coloured canvas, reveals himself." Tom spoke softly, and your skin tingled pleasantly at the warm depth of his voice.

"Oscar Wilde, nice." You smirked at him, causing his eyes to light up yet again.

"You enjoy literature?"

"Probably just as much as art."

"Literature is art though, wouldn't you say?"

"It is indeed." You replied softly, smiling. "Maybe that's why I enjoy it so much."

For the next hour, or maybe rather hours –who could tell how much time passed when so lost in each other's captivating presence?– you and Tom stayed sitting on that couch, ignoring everything and everyone outside of your conversation. Talking to him was so much more than you had ever imagined, so utterly intriguing and captivating… You had completely fallen for him before you knew.

"Y/n…" Tom started, velvety voice wrapping around your senses like liquid sin. "I…"

He was interrupted by an assistant stepping up to the couch hastily, letting Tom know that he needed to get to his signing table ASAP, being twenty minutes late already. Your heart fell upon those words, more than you would've assumed, as it meant that you would have to leave too. That the little time you had with Tom had come to an end. But you wouldn't be so foolish as to assume that any of this would lead to anything more than a nice memory.

With a sad smile you couldn't really brighten up, you rose to your feet, urging Tom to do the same.

"It was truly lovely meeting you, Tom. A dream." You said gently as you stood right in front of him, the assistant having left to be of use elsewhere.

"It is your dream. You decide where it goes from here." He replied in the same soft quiet, looking down at you in both affection and reluctance. "I'm afraid I find it rather impossible to part from you. What are we to do about that?"

"You will go your way and I will go mine… And by tonight you won't remember my name, my face or my words anyway. I'm one in a million, a passing star in an entire universe of equals." You smiled at him with a heavy heart, meaning your words to be encouraging rather than saddening. "While you, Tom, you contain multitudes all by yourself."

"I'm your equal, Y/n…" He protested lightly, frowning with an almost shy smile. "I want to be."

"You do?" Your eyes widened as gentle a shiver ran down your spine.

"Of course." His smile widened for a moment, and his eyes flicked down to the small gap between you very briefly before he looked back to your eyes and let his fingers brush gently against yours. The minimal touch left your skin ablaze in an instant, scorching liquid heat running wildly through your veins. Your breath hitched, and his smile widened even more. "I have to go to my signing now, or Luke will have my head. But I'm refusing to let you go, and I would be the luckiest man in all those multitudes if you would wait for me here. I'm gonna be all yours once I return."

With your stomach in pleasant coils, and your heart in his hands already, you didn't even need to think before nodding with the happiest smile. "I will be here. How long does the signing take?"

"Sometimes, just a second, my dear." He grinned at you, giving your hand a light squeeze before jogging off to where the man in the suit was waiting for him with a roll of his eyes and a smirk. And as you watched Tom leaving, winking at you once more before he was out of sight, you already couldn't wait for his return.

______________________________

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incarnateirony · 4 years

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i think there’s a distinction that needs to be made. i think those with power over dabb & co are the ones who are exuding more habits of queerbaiting, while dabb and co aren’t. and because those execs are more or less invisible, the blame/fault is put on dabb as he’s the perceived figurehead of everything in the show when he’s not. anything he may want to put in the show can be easily vetoed by a higher exec so

Okay so I said I wouldn’t touch related issues facing wanky-side, but while this runs the line this is such a genuine, and valid thought process it feels worth addressing.

So in short: Yes. But no. But yes. But no. But we’ll see.

What do I mean by that? I’m going to put this behind a cut. But first of all I want to thank this Nonnie for at least trying to critically think about where the problems lead to. This is FAR BETTER CRITICAL THINKING than I see in this discussion most of the time and this. More like this. Nuance, discussion, idea trade, history. Let’s do it.

Okay, so.

How can it be yes no yes no maybe eenie meenie miney mo?

Because it really depends on what part of this 15 year legacy show we’re talking about.

What I’m about to say isn’t going to be popular, but I’ve said it before, I just can’t find the ancient ass post discussing it.

We’re going to rewind. Like, a fucking lot. A lot, a lot. This is going to be a history ride, and you’re probably going to wonder how it connects to the conversation at first, but bear with me.

Ignoring any personal frustrations I have with the casting of season 4 – frankly a chapter of this FUCKING show that haunts me somewhere in the ballpark of, “If my friend wasn’t dismissed as not white enough and got the role, would we have Misha, Destiel, any of this, would the show be on, would she have been chased off as the other actresses?” – and frankly these are the things people don’t even fucking *think* about.

TLDR a bajillion years ago CW made a casting call and we got this super cute character named Anna that Dean was slated to bend over in two seconds flat, as old canon used to be before modernly growing. The actress expressed discomfort, and frankly went over with the audience about as well as wet cardboard. And like, while I agree that a lot of women were hated for misogynistic reasons in this show, she really was about as interesting as a plank of plywood to me once she got past her first performance or two.

At the same time, this handsome bastard named Misha Collins auditioned for a bit role originally intended for 3 episodes and quickly extended to 6. But, identified as lightning in a bottle and with on-fire chemistry, while Anna waffled for *several* reasons, summarily, their story ends swapped. That’s… not like *exactly* what happened but it’s *basically* what happened. Anna became the herald and contagonist instead of Cas, and Cas quite frankly took on the role of the goddess.

With Lisa already entered before Anna, there’s no evidence whatsoever she was intended as endgame. Story flip. Thank you for everything last night on earth fall by angel banishing almost like this was foreshadowed woohoo! But… don’t lend towards a relationship. No point. Given, they made a few jokes on set at that point, but it wasn’t really an idea *they thought anyone took seriously*.

Coming from a phase where most of the leads were introduced to “slash fandom” by Wincest, which they literally used to torture and prank each other, the idea of this being anything serious really wasn’t on their radar. The one I remember most was Misha choosing to sit on Dean’s side of the bed as Cas in the famous “What were you dreaming about?” and Sgriccia being like “that’s kinda gay” “nah keep it”

I mean, is that… queerbait at that point? I don’t think it’s fair to really call it that. They respectfully tried to scrub out the leading romantic edges from what would have been Anna’s story, but ultimately, the human psyche kind of recognizes 8000 years of storytelling history subconsciously when using the Hero’s Journey narrative, so it was resonant. Nobody was crazy for seeing it. That didn’t mean it was right, that didn’t mean it’s what they were consciously leading anyone for.

Hell, Jensen didn’t even know what the fuck Destiel WAS until season 7 (”Deathstiel?”) due to the way cons, circuits, and fansites kept the conversation force-muted at that point. Anything they had floated somewhere in the area of “hah that is kinda gay I guess”, and even that there’s no evidence of being frequent.

Kripke left, the show petered, social media was new, and summarily, Sera Gamble was a dumbass and listened to the wrong crowd that seemed super big back when big accounts were a whole 10K followers and you had 50 asshats screaming as a coordinated group about Ruining The Show™. Ratings tanked, somewhere between Misha being fired and the show turning into a parody of itself with dick jokes that made it seem like Gamble was trying to target 11 year old boys for her audience, and like, that’s it, that was the season.

Until that nosedive spiral essentially turned into a shorthand apology reversal, a panicked and roughly written script that was *SO GAY* that *EVEN MISHA FUCKING COLLINS* couldn’t seriously choke out the dialogue. It was cheap, it was out of character, and as Jensen put it, the dialogue might as well have had him petting and sobbing into Castiel’s coat while essentially being like I SLEEP WITH YOUR COAT EVERY NIGHT TO REMEMBER YOUR SCENT UWU and shit that just LITERALLY vaulted from alien fascinated staring into desperate teenage gay drama in the body of a 30 year old man.

So yeah. Did I consider it reasonable to change that? Fuck yes I did.

Was what Sera Gamble did queerbait? Yes, actually. And she did it again in the Magicians. You see, Gamble had fucked over an audience, and then tried to exploit that audience in reverse when she realized she fucked over the *wrong* audience, but had zero intent of fulfillment.

And then magically, Sera Gamble didn’t fucking work there anymore after a whole like, year and a half as showrunner.

Now, at the same time, Dawn Ostroff was leaving the CW. Jensen’s had some pretty fierce words about Dawn Ostroff not understanding the show and how to manage it, but whatever. Bye, Dawn. Hello… MARK FUCKING PEDOWITZ. But at the same time, WELCOME BACK CARVER and most of all HOWDY DO NETFLIX, so nice to make a guaranteed deal with you (that ended as of this year due to a CBS merchandising meltdown).

When Carver came back, he said a lot of things. He… very tactfully called Gamble’s era trash by phasing it like “:) Watching the show :) since I left :) I realized :) a lot of our mythology :) has been difficult to follow :) so I went :) back to basics :) please help”, and others, like mentioning he had a three year plan on his desk. So 3. Season 8, 9, 10. He had notes for his S10 finale in mind and everything! Great stuff.

Now the fandom, at this point, generally didn’t pay attention to the network or production. In fact, the actor worship around here is some other kind of wild and I don’t know how after 15 years people haven’t figured out that it isn’t how to go about paying attention. Either way – plot switches, showrunner switches, author switches, and NETWORK LEADERSHIP SWITCHES.

Now, this little part here is speculation – but I am 99% sure that when Carver was pulling SPN out of the cancellation toilet, he had bigger things to inform the new execs about than “btw I might make it gay.” Like “Hey, since CW just got its netflix deal, if you give us another year we can import fresh demographic while bringing back Collins’ old fanbase by setting him back as a regular.” SURE, SOUND GREAT, MAKE MONEY, THX.

Cool. Cool. Make sense so far, you still with me?

Because at this point, S8 into early S9, fandom had gotten itself into all kinds of a stir. It was about to go canon, rite nao, said a bunch of bloggers, who at that point WERE pretty much chasing wallpapers and Tshirts and making the most bizarre uncorroborated parallel interpretations like “IF U PARALLEL IT TO MOBY DICK-” WHAT WHY WHERE– ??? BUT cAS = fISH

Okay, my fucking annoyance at what counted as lit crit in those days aside, we’ll get back on track. Everybody started vibrating for this shit because, you know what, S8 did resonate pretty strong, almost like authors were toying with ideas. I’m not gonna get into stuff about Robbie, I THINK fandom knows the statements he’s made and I don’t just mean the whole Destiel being canon tweet both antis and bitters descended on him to eviscerate him about. About what? Calling it queerbait!

So here we go, the great advent. About a year after a dramatic network shift, a CW exec was like :))))))))) I’D LIKE TO LEARN ABOUT THIS FANDOM THAT IS SUDDENLY MAKING ME MONEY!! WHAT SHOULD I DO??? TO TWITTER! HASHTAG TALK TO THEM!

[logs in]

Beep boop. “Destiel?” “Destiel?” “Destiel?” “Destiel?” “Destiel?” “Destiel?” “Destiel?” “Destiel?” “Destiel?” “Destiel?” “Destiel?” “Destiel?” “Destiel?” “Destiel?” “Destiel?” the FUCK is a Destiel? Wait what no I don’t know what you’re talking about representation isn’t our intention with these characters. “QUEERBAIT” “QUEERBAIT” “QUEERBAIT” “QUEERBAIT” “QUEERBAIT” “QUEERBAIT” “QUEERBAIT” “QUEERBAIT” “QUEERBAIT” “QUEERBAIT” “QUEERBAIT”

And then the network exec got so slammed he deleted twitter entirely and everybody popped confetti and felt accomplished and did NOT realize how fucking BAD that was. And frankly, anyone that did kinda didn’t want to admit it, because taking responsibility for that tire fire was… not… attractive. In fact, several folks are still around to this day, bitter blogging or making weirdass meta or accusing other people of wallpapers and Tshirts because that’s what they did so *YAY, PROJECTION!*

My own frustrated bitterness aside, I’m going to place some questions down, and not so much answer them as, now that the reader has really taken history in, let them decide:

At this point… is this queerbait?

Because this is when the queerbait yelling began. It’s when every fan with even a moderate platform or site blasted it out there.

It’s when the fandom made DeanCas a big problem.

And it’s also literally the same time Carver left his very first recorded, known direction with a romantic tilt, “The note I got from Jeremy Carver was to play it like a jilted lover, so that’s what we played there,” on LGBT author Bobo berens’ very first episode. Everyone runs circles around that modernly, or goes “SEE??? QUEERBAIT!” without realizing what the FUCK just happened here.

So, SPN went from cancel rating line to their most successful show between 7 and 9. Suddenly corporate sees their successful product *ON FUCKING FIRE* so do you know what happens?

Fuck it this IS one line I’ll break: Corporate panicked. They changed their press packets. If you noticed a bunch of media-adjacent people and their friends suddenly get bitter as FUCK in season 10 after still surviving the S9 mess, here’s fucking why. Because now that everybody spent the last YEAR trying to burn down the product yelling about shit that corporate had been literally blindsided by, they added temporarily a new section to the packet that included sexuality. They were, at that moment, suddenly listed collectively as heterosexual men. SEE, WE AREN’T QUEERBAITING IF WE TELL YOU THEY’RE STRAIGHT *will smith pose*

Congrats fandom, you have now officially made Destiel A Huge Problem™ to the corporate behemoth behind the shiny pictures. The iron curtain dropped. This is what you could call “Protect the Product Mode” if you will.

Now again, at this point: Is it queerbait?

Because at this point, S9-10 was rolling out. We all know it, Cain, Collette, *gestures off into infinity* But let’s fall back to Carver’s statement. 3 years. 8, 9, 10. You know what else happened season 10?

A bunch of shit, including shit Carver *wrote himself for the season 10 finale* got filmed, then cut. Coincidentally, it was all very gay shit. Things that pulled forward the Crowley/Abaddon Cas/Colette Sam/Abel parallels, arguing over who was who’s boyfriend, Rowena mentioning about them both being shattered at the Altar of Winchester (15.3 is calling), the secret admirer dream, I could go on. I mean, this shit literally would have shifted the entire storytelling arc to full-frontal taking that parallel and addressing it right up in your face. First you’ll kill your mistress but you’ll get it done, and then you’ll kill your wife. He’s your boyfriend no he’s YOUR boyfriend. You’ve BOTH been shattered at the Altar of Winchester. Really, this is what you dream about? Your secret admirer Cas?

K? K. K?

Is it queerbait for Carver to have entered with a plan? Is it queerbait for Carver to have been interrupted on that plan despite attempting to pursue it? And is it queerbait for the network to still lock down on that plan so close after the event?

You see why this conversation gets increasingly complex.

S11 rolled around, Carver was half in half out, Dabb was stepping in, big gay heart songs, take what you will out of that entire mess, and by S12 Dabb entirely took over and we started entering the era we are in today.

So let’s address where we’re at today.

Now :) I can’t say anything for sure :) because anybody that’s been to or worked on marketing stuff definitely has an NDA :) but let’s play for a minute. Let’s say with the stone wall up, a set of creators still wanted to actually *go somewhere* with this story.

“But!” remembered the network, “Remember the tire fire?! And all the people that hated the gay?! What about our profit?!”

“No,” a creator might say, “Tides have changed.”

“We’ll see,” a network might say, “Take it to market testing.” At which point, one would enter a few years of polling how the general audience reacts to this.

Now, if they were seeing promising numbers, they might be given a bit of rope. Why, let’s … just pretend. Totally. Totally pretending. That Dabb pitched this idea to take up Carver’s mantle. Let’s say that started S12ish when he took over. Let’s say they ran through hiatus. And then… authors might be given a little bit of a line. “Looks good, but we’re not sure,” said a network quite fond of its split conservative/liberal demographic, “Try it out a bit and see how it goes.”

And so an author room that would be full of LGBT creators fed out good faith groundwork. They might even be like YALL ITS NEVER TOO LAAAAAATE TO START ALL OVER AGAIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIN and just throw their whole boy howdy cowboy into that shit and get great ratings.

What if even if the results came back positive leaning, the network ho’ed and hummed and stayed noncommital? Might the creators scale it back while still writing it lowkey just in case they got flashed a greenlight? I know I sure would, woudn’t you?! Or I guess would you prefer we drop the whole thing cold and stop writing anything vaguely in the direction?

Difficult question, in reality, isn’t it?

So in this TOTALLY HYPOTHETICAL SITUATION, this leaves the authors holding the bag, waiting for a sign, and being held with limitations. And just in case anybody thinks “BUT AUTHORS CAN DO WHATEVER THEY WANT!! AND!! OTHER SHOWS!!!”

K have we come down to reality yet? So, sure kids, try the gay, we’re interested, but you can’t like, go Full Gay Frontal with it. You gotta imply the gay. Wouldn’t want to offend conservative america! Besides! We’re totally exploiting marketing making this LGBT content for you over here! *jingles a carrot on a stick* LOOK AT HOW MUCH WE’RE FLEECING ADVERTISING PROMOTING ALL THIS GAY STUFF FOR YOU AREN’T THE RAINBOWS GREAT?

Some creator of limited LGBT content: How’s the marketing looking?

Some network: EH! We’ll see!

Some creator of limited LGBT content: K guys we’ll scale it back to not upset them but don’t drop it.maybe we can have them hold hands at the end or if we’re lucky maybe they’ll say we can do the whole thing

Some LGBT creators: K

Making sense still? STILL WITH ME?

So at this point… is this queerbait, or is this business?

Put aside the emotional reaction. Realize this really only hit scale in S9, hit front line S10, and hit potential corporate discussion in this TOTALLY theoretic universe around S11-12. We’re talking 3-4 years. Not 10. And we’re talking only a few of it really being tested.

So again I ask, history minded: Is this queerbait, or is this business?

That’s where the nuance and complication comes in, and let it be said I am in no way defending the CW. I fucking hate the network. They have literally personally screwed over real friends of mine and I hope they choke on a whole bag of dicks with their bullshit, but honestly, the shit I have seen and heard would make people stick their heads in the sand like scared and ashamed ostriches for every time they trumpet “BUT OTHER SHOWS” – you don’t know what’s going on in those shows. You don’t know how they’re getting hardballed on budget decisions, you don’t know what that show’s marketed demographic is about, you don’t know what they demand cast how, you literally don’t have a fucking idea unless you’re up in that disaster zone.

And even IF you’re in that disaster zone, unless you’re truly in the upper echelon, you only know so much.

Now let’s pretend, again, totally metaphorically, and absolutely not inspired by a real person at all, that someone worked with the crew for a while and, because they saw support inside creeping upward siiiiince mmmm gosh we’ll say season 12 since that’s our advent and totally not when anybody specific started working there and telling fandom ladder fans what they thought they saw going on, only to get sad and bitter and angry and eventually leave, and all those friends, still abiding old bitterness from S9~, now get angrier because of somebody else’s burnout on their ITK level and perspective, even if that was *probably* aggravated by other work stress conditions as well, but hey! WHO KNOWS!?!?! :)))) What a weird hypothetical though and I’m getting weirdly super specific on it aren’t I so LET’S MOVE ON.

We’re in S12-13 discussion category now.

So my question is, from this perspective… when do you call queerbait? When not swept up in misguided hysteria… at what point do you say “Yeah, you know what, yup, that’s all queerbait”?

So we’re gonna take a bit of a break here for a second and really process all of that hypothetical world, where a creator pitched going for it, and got it put into market testing, and was given enough rope to hang themselves on if the network changed its mind.

After only a few years of conscious thought on it… do you even think the network is truly consciously misguiding specifically those fans, or do they see it as giving the fans something they want while testing the idea of possibly truly giving it to them?

Because here’s what fandom misses – the corporate perspective. And again, I’m utterly not fucking justifying the CW as a whole, but people look at this from the angle of fans, and then argue what they think is representative dialogue from the angle of fans, often while missing all of this history. All that history up till S9? That’s all very real. But looking at history in perspective… who are you going to blame for that? Is it fair to hold S4-9 to that five year stretch of queerbait when that was… pretty much fandom manufactured from blissful ignorance to begin with? I mean if you want to go yell at Sera Gamble Specifically okay (please don’t) but beyond that like– that shit? Is that anybody’s fault? Do you blame a company for actually shutting DOWN the talk of it on a press angle? Can we call that and S10 queerbait then? Was Carver’s attempt at writing through it queerbait? Was trying to continue the story in S11 after theoretic shutdown queerbait? These are all genuine questions that are not asked enough. Most people don’t even realize they need to be asked.

So back to Totally Theoretic Land, where S12ish market testing would have been going on to see if people really thought it was Gay N Shit. Like a lot of people in an overwhelming majority after the amount of apprehension the straight old dude running the network has ever since the goddamn tornado of horse shit that happened like a year after he took over. Probably not the fondest fucking memory for him either. Probably also why he dismissively called most of that demographic “casual fans”, because in Smug White Guy Brain, “tru” fans would have all known, I guess, exactly the shit I’m telling you in history backtrack so, look at the silly girls wanting the gay shit :) Ahhhh girlllllls

Okay so, my impression of douchebags aside, let’s give it 12-13 hiatus to give the first test rope lead and 13-14 hiatus for the next, only to have at best noncommital and uncertain numbers and authors, theoretically, cautiously pulling back while writing it as generally established and implicit, as if it might, I don’t know, go from BIG GAY DRAMA to DEADASS DOMESTIC all of a sudden despite ITS NEVER TOO LATE TO START ALL OVER AGAIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIN cuz get it, they started over, after he came in his room and played him. *elbows* You all get it right?

K. So maybe numbers changed. Maybe they don’t. Maybe I’m not comfortable talking in this hypothetical, maybe I don’t have access to this hypothetical AU’s current marketing data as of this year, I just don’t know! We don’t know where those cards fell.

But if, at this point, after 2-3 years of market testing, and leading authors on, and giving them enough rope to hang themselves with to get themselves accused of queerbait just for trying to lay good faith groundwork for a cohesive narrative, because fans don’t care that 2 open closet LGBT authors are on deck or that there’s totally theoretically probably and in no way fingering anyone at least one closeted author on deck, or at least publicly so, their coworkers would probably know. But I mean. That’s just. :) statistics. Right?

K whatever moving on. If at this point they’ve been boggley bounced around… you know, I gotta say. At this point… I might actually call queerbait if the network stonewalls it. At this point, they’ve had a few years to really get their shit together, and if they’ve just used it to play yo yo with LGBT creators trying to make content then yeah, go suck a whole bag of dicks.

The problem being with the lack of nuance in this conversation, you’re right, Dabb and co would catch it rather than the guilty party, which is why I HATE faux activism culture. If you’re going to be an activist pay the fuck attention to what you’re being an activist in, don’t bite the hand that’s feeding you just because it was a PBJ and not filet mignon, go after the bastard 1%’er that’s eating all the goddamn filet mignon. But nobody will. It never works like that. And then everybody wonders why this continues – be it in this show, or on other networks.

But hey. Maybe this theoretic network got enough material to change their mind. Maybe another executive got promoted that might help one of the other creators argue it to corporate with their new shiny title. Maybe they can convince someone. Convince them of what and to what level, who knows. Maybe just continue telling the established story, give them a divorce, mention marriage, divorce, dead wives, breakups every 0.2 seconds while they go through a classically framed dark point in the romance everybody with brains and eyes understands because, again, historic storytelling we literally all recognize, but pretend we don’t when stomping about personal representation lines? Or hey! Maybe it’ll go further. (Don’t hold your breath.) Throw in some other shit that even a straight guy would look at and be like “two dicks one chick that shit’s gay bro” because WE LITERALLY ALL FUCKING KNOW WHAT IT MEANS EVEN IF IT’S IMPLIED BECAUSE THE NETWORK IS A BUNCH OF PUSSIES.

…*stops, breathes*

If you can’t tell this is a very long term topic of frustration to me, because nobody, absolutely nobody, wants to introspect and think, you know, maybe it wasn’t queerbait back then, maybe we SHOULDN’T have set a corporate exec on fire about it, that might have been fucking bad.

There are other ways to be an activist than to scream queerbait into the void at whoever is unfortunate enough to cross your paths. One of the best examples I can remember is Exorcising Emily collecting demographics on fandom, and testimonials from LGBT fans about resonating with the content – no fanfic, no fanart, no attacks – and sent copies of this to several powerful creative names.

Now… if with this history… if, from season 9 to 12… one of those names became a creator. If, by some FLUKE of imagination… he still had that book around… and even gave it to his freshly joined new employees like 2 weeks after they started working there–

oh wait and i oop

The mentions would be much as you expect, antis screaming and demanding her job (QUICK, somebody tell Andrew Dabb that she’s READING ANDREW DABB’S OWN BOOKS THAT HE CHOSE TO KEEP AROUND FOR THREE YEARS).

Has Dabb’s era seemed… more plugged in? More resonant? Better and stronger in its storytelling? More hooked into fandom?

See, that’s what well thought activism can do. Well thought activism can structure an entire movement. Poorly thought rioting thinking itself as activism can cause the literal opposite effect of what it wanted. That is how these things contrast each other. And that is something fandom needs to DEEPLY consider.

…but is it queerbait for him to try to continue the story? Even if, say, we drop the marketing talk, because TOTALLY nobody can ACTUALLY know because AGAIN anyone that DOES would have an NDA so we DEFINITELY can’t say anybody knows anything for sure, because anyone that said jack shit would probably get sued so hard their descendents down in whatever homo superior evolution 1000 years into the future would feel it, so you know. We’ll put aside this totes theoretical shit and ask

…If he just was told no– would you prefer to just drop the storyline entirely at this point?

Again. Genuine question. And difficult. And something poorly thought queerbait screaming can actually cause, too.

So here we are in the land of the final season. Whether you consider it network queerbait or not – again, they can choke on the whole bag of dicks at a network level for all I care for ANY number of reasons, even well beyond the domain of Supernatural, and may all their bacon burn from here into the next life – it’s a lot more complicated than fandom has ever let it on to be, because letting it on to be what it really is, in full perspective, also demands a lot of introspection and acceptance, and we all know nobody in this fandom can ever make a mistake ever and they’re all fucking perfect darlings.

It’s a complicated answer to a simple idea… and unfortunately I don’t think this fandom will ever really sit here. They’ll yell “VICTIM BLAMING” because it��s buzzy, they’ll yell “HIDING YOUR GAYS” which I mean, yeah, but let’s talk about what led us here. They’ll yell a lot of things. But they will rarely quietly think, and study, and hone down to what’s going on in the world out there beyond what they have, at this point, become obsessively hotlocked on.

Supernatural, as of 15.7, has already taken several steps further than it ever is before. No, that’s not a signal of me saying [Your Personal Goalpost] is going to happen. But it’s a sign that if they have a line, they’re testing it with every strength they have.

Going back onto the Fateful Advent: Cain. The mentor– who was never going to stop; I can’t stop samuel; he was never going to stop; I will never stop; Rowena, the mentor, never going to stop, shattered, at the altar of Winchester. Long ago, when Cas was human, Dean sealed him away, and now, he’s doing the same to him. So Shirt Of Bad Decisions Deanmon basically karaokes with his friend like the Crowley days, REPEATING the Crowley dialogue but infinitely harder to dodge, as if some sort of calculated method of cat’s cradle of How To Write The Gay was discussed. Man, whoever wrote that kind of shit would probably even publicly thank whatever big gay mastermind helped them map out THAT level of stuff. Wouldn’t it be funny if most of that shit had been written by a gay dude that’s still around and it’s still popping back up in the show louder and harder to dodge than before? That’d be fuckin’ wild, man. Oh, fucking WAIT.

And this is why I hate the way shipping culture thinks it’s doing activism. Most of the time it’s cosplaying as an activist and at this point it’s become more of a furry convention than it has any kind of organized rights movement. Nobody’s out here fighting for the rights of these LGBT authors this year, nobody’s helping them get a voice, and in fact, often scream at them or bury what voice they’ve had as not enough.

And I want to fix it.

Desperately.

And frankly, I don’t know how anymore.

But what we’re not talking about is some 3-5 year show that came in early and started intentionally fucking at you. We’re looking at happy coincidences, so let’s check with our gay king, the father of Wayward that everybody coincidentally accepted as canon with far less because of a (meaningful) third party line DeanCas had elsewhere but hey it didn’t have antis so suddenly it counts; let’s check with him about that.

That’s my king. That’s my king that wrote the first recorded episode to be intentionally directed as jilted lovers. My king that gav eus Colette. My king that gave us the mixtape. My king that gave us the PR framed breakup. My king that gave us Cas leaving Dean. That’s my King. That’s my gay king who has been fighting his ass off, only to be hung out to dry by a fandom that doesn’t even care to look where or how to scream, or maybe consider that perhaps screaming isn’t the option.

Is he yours yet? Have I broken through to a single soul on this?

That’s my king who wrote about the necessary evils in 2003, before the youngest in this fandom were born and while many were still in diapers or kindergarten; about the unfortunate necessary evils that he loathes and acknowledges about moderate queer content gaining exponential amounts of platform compared to whatever is considered hardline aggressive at the time, about how that incrementalization is what helped our media landscape evolve to this day.

And he isn’t wrong.

And he’s getting roasted for doing just that.

And I really wish I could just psychically make everyone fucking stop.

But I will say one thing.

“It’s network queerbait!” I mean

Yeah

That

Because… realistically? like 99% of modern queer content is queerbait, even stuff with canon queer content.

ESPECIALLY on the CW.

If you’ve noticed CW panicking the last year and trying to slap rainbows and DARE TO DEFY on everything, it’s because their entire fucking ecosystem just got fucked over by CBS wanting 100% merchandising profit like it already took 100% digital profit and Netflix was basically like “miss us with your bullshit” and broke the CW contract which was *HOW PEDOWITZ BANKROLLED MOST OF HIS NETWORK*. Now? Now CW has to carve a niche. So LOOK AT ALL THE FUCKING PRIDE COLORS ON– OUR– STRAIGHT–CHARACTERS??? BUT WE HAVE GAY ONES LIKE LEGENDS OF TOMORROW AND *flips notes* THAT SIDE CHARACTER LESBIAN ON SPN.

*gets a whisper* What they killed her? Shit. Maybe bring her back. AND THERE’S THIS PERSON OVER ON JANE THE VIRGIN oh that just got cancelled uhhh VAMPIRE DI-wait fuck. Well we’ll just make one of the chicks in this shitty charmed reboot CBS just forced down our throat and killed Wayward over, that’ll fix it *jazz hands*

TV is a business. Businesses make money. The entire LGBT battle is basically us industriously proving we can make money. It’s about rights and visibility on our end, but on their end it is *always* about money and I really don’t think anybody really groks what that really means.

So “it’s the network! Queerbait!”

…yeahhhhh.

…welcome to working in television. Now you just have to sit and think about how many other times this has completely missed your radar.

The network will never get a shit about you, they give a shit about your money, and that’s just the reality of capitalist america whether we like it or not. When it’s 2143 and bernie sanders’ floating head in a jar is president and andrew yang’s base income shit is in effect and we’re all a socialist country and the world has figured out how to run high cost businesses like TV on the power of unicorn farts, they might actually give a shit. But they don’t. There may be a few advocates WITHIN the company that do, but as a whole body, the network will never give a shit. They don’t care if you’re black, white, straight, gay, disabled, male, female, beyond what, explicitly, that totals to in dollar signs depending how they feed you, when and where.

So it’s not like... *just* a queer rights issue, it’s an “Anything Trump’s America may consider offensive on their television” issue. It’s businesses weighing who they think pays their bills while making it and beyond that who they think is the safest investment to make the most money.

As a side note: Personally, I’d consider it dumb as fuck to not do it. SPN will taper within a few years down to just trekkie-esque addicts unless they find a way to get a new burst of viewership and boy howdie do I hope so, but how much Pedowitz overvalues the conservative US demographic, or certain international markets, I don’t know. I’m not in his head and I don’t have this year’s marketing numbers beyond basic live, +3 and +7 ratings, and digital calls. And just general nielsen released demo. But how he’s added that all up? Can’t say. And I sure ain’t gonna bank on him not being a dumbass, when he’s famous for it, so don’t go get your hopes up either.

#supernatural #representation #queerbait #intersectionality #business #corporate #marketing

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shalebridge-cradle · 3 years

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Historical References in What Are You Going to Do With Your Life - Chapters 10-12

Chapter 10

Boleyn mumbles something about a priest. W. S. Pakenham-Walsh (1868 - 1960), Vicar of Sulgrave, Northhamptonshire, had a strong interest in Anne Boleyn. He claimed to have a series of spiritual experiences after praying at Boleyn’s burial site, and contacted clairvoyants to channel her spirit in the hopes she might become his guardian angel. He also claimed in his diary that he had contact with Henry VIII and other notable members of the Tudor court.

While witchcraft was often punished via the death penalty, Henry VIII made the law explicit in 1542 (though it was later repealed no later than 1547, under Edward VI). Several witchcraft laws were made in the UK over the years, in 1563, 1604, 1649 and 1735. These were all repealed and replaced with more general consumer protection laws, and the last person to be indicted for witchcraft (under the 1735 act) was imprisoned in 1944.

Tarot was a regular set of cards for most of its history, used in various, but similar, trick-taking card card games. It became associated with ancient wisdom in 1781, when Antoine Court de Gébelin wrote an essay claiming (with no evidence) that ancient Egyptian priests had distilled the mystical Book of Thoth into the cards.

“Psychic is Greek, and clairvoyant is French. One is about thinking, and the other is about seeing.” Psychic comes from the Greek word psychikos (‘of the mind’) and clairvoyance is a combination of two French words (‘clear’ and ‘vision’). Catherine of Aragon was known to speak both French and Greek, as well as Latin, her native Spanish, and English.

Cunning man (or woman) was another word for folk healers.

In 1532, Catherine Parr’s brother-in-law from her second marriage, William Neville, was accused of treason for allegedly predicting the king’s death and his own ascension as Earl of Warwick (a title made extinct during the Wars of the Roses, but would be recreated in 1547 and twice after that). He went to at least three magicians to confirm this prediction, all of which agreed that it was meant to be true (it wasn’t). One of these magicians was Richard Jones of Oxford, who was imprisoned and questioned on the matter. He did his best to exonerate himself of responsibility. I have found five references confirming his existence – but many of them claim he had a sceptre he used to ‘summon the four king devils’, which he used for divination purposes.

Chapter 11

Jones of Oxford was taken in for questioning as part of the Neville affair, and he did his best in his confession to exonerate himself. Neville’s claims of a prophetic dream showing himself as Earl of Warwick were now a “fair castle” which Neville assumed must be the castle of Warwick, and a shield with “sundry arms I could not rehearse”. He did admit to writing “a foolish letter or two according to [Neville’s] foolish desire, to make pastime to laugh at”. No treason, just jokes, please don’t execute me Thomas Cromwell. Jones claimed to take his alchemy seriously, however, and wrote that “To make the philosopher’s stone I will jeopard my life, so to do it,” if the king so wished. He would require twelve months “upon silver” and twelve and a half “upon gold”, and was willing to be imprisoned while he worked. Jones made a similar offer to Cromwell, but there is no evidence either man accepted. Jones was released in exchange for revealing incriminating evidence against another figure of interest. The other magicians caught up in this incident, William Wade and a man known only as ‘Nashe’, had perfected their disappearing act and were not sent to the Tower.

There is a story that Elizabeth I attributed the destruction of the Spanish armada in 1588 to John Dee’s wizardry. Given that, as mentioned, Dee was out of favour with Elizabeth at the time, this is likely untrue.

Elizabeth I’s death was in March of 1603, after she became sick and remained in a “settled and unmovable melancholy”, sitting on a cushion and staring at nothing. The death of a close friend in February of that year came as a particular blow – that of her second cousin and First Lady of the Bedchamber, Catherine Howard.

James I (or James VI, depending on where you’re from)… James I of England was also James VI of Scotland. His mother was Mary Queen of Scots, who was executed by Elizabeth I, and his great-grandmother was Margaret Tudor, Henry VIII’s sister.

“Anna, born Duchess of Jülich, Cleves and Berg.” This was how Anna signed hers’ and Henry’s marriage treaty, known as the ‘Beer Pot Documents’, because someone drew a stein at the bottom.

Bowling, as a game, can trace its origins back to ancient Egypt, and has been quite popular the world over throughout history. Henry VIII was an avid bowler himself (when Hampton Court was remodelled, bowling alleys were included with tennis courts and tiltyards), but banned the sport for the lower classes. The law against workers bowling (unless it was Christmas and in their master’s presence) was repealed in 1845.

We return to the ground, because from it we were taken. Paraphrasing of Genesis 3:19.

The (possible) first appearance of the word ‘alligator’ in the English language is from Romeo and Juliet. The description of The Apothecary’s shop mentions “a tortoise hung, an alligator stuff’d, and other skins of ill-shaped fishes”. Traditionally, medieval apothecaries and astrologers kept skeletons, fossils, and/or taxidermied pieces on display to demonstrate their worldliness.

The anger over calling the alligator ‘William’ could come from Parr, or from Anna. Her brother’s name, Wilhelm, is often anglicised as William.

Midsomer county does not exist and never has. It’s the setting for the long-running mystery TV show Midsomer Murders. Incidentally, Catherine Parr’s native county of Westmorland existed at one point, but no longer does (the area is now in the county of Cumbria). She is not the only English-born queen who this applies to; Jane Seymour’s Wiltshire and Anne Boleyn’s Norfolk still exist (and have since antiquity), but Katherine Howard was most likely born in Lambeth, which would have been in the county of Middlesex at the time. The area is now under the ceremonial county of Greater London.

“Honestly? Margaret Pole’s was worse.” Margaret Pole, Countess of Sailsbury and the last of the House of York, was kept in the Tower of London for two and a half years for her supposed support of Catholicism’s attempts to overthrow the king, before being informed of her death ‘within the hour’ on the 27th of May, 1541. She answered that she did not know the crime of which she was accused (and had carved a poem into the wall of her cell to that effect), but went to the block anyway. It allegedly took eleven blows from the inexperienced axeman to separate her head from her body. There is another story that she tried to run from the executioner and was killed in the attempt, but this is likely a fabrication. Regardless, pretty much everyone thought this was not only a bad idea on Henry’s part (killing Margaret removed any leverage the king had on her rebellious son, Cardinal Reginald Pole), it was also pointlessly cruel and a painfully undignified end.

(She was also Catherine of Aragon’s lady-in-waiting, and governess to Mary at several points.)

That everyone around her, bar a few visitors, would actively benefit from her death… Yet another quote of Elizabeth Tyrwhitt’s testimony: Parr, on her deathbed, claimed she was “not well-handled” by those around her; “for those that be about me careth not for me, but standeth laughing at my grief, and the more good I will to them, the less good they will to me”.

Chapter 12

According to a lady-in-waiting, Anne Boleyn claimed she would rather see Catherine of Aragon hanged “than have to confess that she was her queen and mistress”. This incident is probably the origin of the lyric “somebody hang you!” from Don’t Lose Ur Head.

Catalina uses a few Spanish phrases in this chapter, which don’t get directly translated. The first, No se hizo la miel para la boca del asno, directly translates to ‘Honey is not made for the donkey’s mouth’, and essentially means ‘Good things shouldn’t be wasted on those who won’t appreciate them’. Lavar cerdos con jabón es perder tiempo y jabón is ‘Washing pigs with soap is a waste of time and soap’, and is meant to indicate some things aren’t worth the energy.

…like that dream she has where she is cut up by a servant… An autopsy was done on Catherine of Aragon as part of the embalming process, which revealed the growth on her heart. This was done by the castle chandler (a dealer or trader) as part of his official duties.

Jane Seymour got rid of most of the hallmarks of Anne Boleyn’s tenure during her own queenship. The extravagance and lavish entertainments were banned, along with the French fashions Boleyn had introduced – including French hoods, which Boleyn is wearing in the portrait we have of her. Jane, as mentioned, wore a gable hood in her portraits.

“I don’t know why I’m so surprised that people care about what I say.” In the words of nineteenth century proto-feminist Agnes Strickland, Jane “passed eighteen months of regal life without uttering a sentence significant enough to warrant preservation”, which is kind of a mean thing to say. Seymour certainly said things during this time, we know this from reports, but there aren’t any direct quotes from her during her time as queen.

Here’s the painting mentioned, from 1545, during Catherine Parr’s tenure. Jane is on Henry’s left.

It was only after her death that Henry ‘loved’ her, but she is certain that he mourned for only for his own loss. There are reports that, during Jane’s labour, doctors advised Henry he might lose either Jane or Edward. Henry is claimed to have replied, “If you cannot save both, at least let the child live, for other wives are easily found.”

Countdown is a British television game show that revolves around word and number puzzles. It has been going for almost forty years, and is one of the longest-running game shows in the world, with over 7000 episodes.

“I saw a ghost bear kill someone, once.” Anne isn’t making this up. Supposedly, the incident occurred in 1816, when a Yeoman Warder saw a ghostly bear somewhere in the Tower of London. Terrified, he tried to stab it with his bayonet, only for the weapon to go through the image and strike the door behind it. The guard died of shock later on. A similar event happened in 1864, where two guards witnessed “a whitish, female figure” gliding towards one of the soldiers. The soldier in question charged this figure, only to go straight through it, upon which he fainted.

Elizabeth was imprisoned in the Tower of London for a little over two months in 1554, as a result of Wyatt’s Rebellion against Queen Mary. The rebellion was also the likely reason for the execution of Lady Jane Grey – both she and Elizabeth were Protestants in line for the throne, and therefore ‘more suitable’ as ruler. Both Elizabeth and Jane Grey denied any involvement, but the latter’s father and brother (also executed) were direct contributors.

“… you did die, Elizabeth was really upset about it…” Elizabeth took the news of Parr’s death badly. She refused to leave her bed, and was unable to go a mile from her residence, for five months following Parr’s passing.

Not because she liked that bearded potato man, God no… I found this deeply cursed engraving (first produced in 1544) in one of my books on the six wives, and now I want you all to suffer with me.

Anne of Cleves reacted poorly to being told her marriage would be annulled – some accounts say she fainted, others says she cried and screamed. Both could be true. The reasons given were threefold – One, the marriage was unconsummated (From testimony given by two servants, Anne thought a kiss goodnight counted as consummation – likely untrue, but this is the only reason that actually has merit). Two, Anne was precontracted to Francis of Lorraine (Untrue – the betrothal would only take effect if Anne’s father paid the dowry, and he didn’t). Three, Anne was not a virgin as claimed, based on the description of her ‘breasts and belly’, a Tudor way of saying Anne had previously given birth (untrue, and conflicts with the testimony for reason one). The annulment went through without Anne’s involvement, but (probably looking at the examples of her three predecessors) she accepted the ruling and kept herself from being banished, beheaded or otherwise.

(Other fact that has no bearing on reality – while researching Anne of Cleves, one of the pages that came up was The Simpsons Wiki. Apparently she’s the only wife who can claim the honour of having been in two episodes. :/)

Dogs don’t need to answer for their sins, they don’t have any. Katherine Howard was reportedly fond of animals in general, but had a particular soft spot for dogs.

She did the right thing. She told the truth. She died for it. Katherine Howard insisted, to the end, that she had no pre-contract of marriage to Francis Dereham. Would she have survived if she said she did?

#the cradle will write #What Are You Going to Do With Your Life: Work

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minaminokyoko · 4 years

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Star Wars: Rise of Skywalker--A Spoilertastic Review

Boy, oh, boy.

Well, it’s over.

And I don’t know how I feel about it.

Let me start as I always do by saying I have no attachment to Star Wars. It’s always just be something to watch for me, nothing more, nothing less. I am ambiguous and apathetic. I admit that the first time I ever perked up was with The Force Awakens, which I still think is on par with the first two original films in terms of being engrossing. I actually liked it more because Rey and Finn connected with me more than I did with Luke as a kid. Then Last Jedi happened and it derailed the places that I had hoped we were going to go. I didn’t dislike Last Jedi, but I certainly didn’t like it either. I appreciate the risks it took, but I felt it didn’t pull them off and that’s why I had zero expectations for this film. It left a lot of people unsure of the future.

And unfortunately, J. J. Abrams pussed out.

There is no other way to say it. He basically listened to the people who complained about The Last Jedi and catered the characters’ development in order to try to please them. Which is shitty as hell.

That being said, this is an enjoyable movie, imo. It’s a satisfying end to the overall Skywalker saga, I think, but not to its original characters. I’ll explain below.

Overall Grade: C+

Spoilers ahead, as always.

Pros:

-The action is great. Just great. Really engrossing, really fun sequences. Everyone pulls their weight, too, unlike the subplots in Last Jedi. It’s also visually stunning. It’s a polished film, much like what we’ve been enjoying about the Mandolorian, how it integrates real sets with effects instead of just that sterile bluescreen nonsense Disney has been doing recently.

-Reuniting Finn, Rey, and Poe was a fucking Godsend. They are so likable together. It was the whole reason I liked The Force Awakens so much. They’re a good group and you really root for them the entire time. I’m glad they let them be in the story together. It’s the way it should be. They have a ton of chemistry and I would like it very much if they are kicking off an original franchise now that they have ended the Skywalker saga. We’ll see.

-Poe in particular is a lot of fun in this film, which is much needed since he was such a headstrong pain in the Last Jedi. Here he’s back to being just charming and salty and likable as hell. I really enjoyed Isaac finding a path for Poe, because at first he was kind of filling the snarky badass role that Han Solo did but he found his own way and I like him a lot for that same reason. He’s convicted but he’s softened up from how he was in Last Jedi and I think it works great.

-Rey being at the center of the story—and don’t worry, we’ll talk about this below, ugh—even though I highly disagree with the direction they took her in, is still great. I like that they still didn’t listen to the whiny gits who hate a woman being a Jedi. I like that Rey is fighting every second to hold onto her own truth and be her own person. Good for you, girlie. I do hope she gets more stories. She’s a good bean.

-The tribute to Carrie Fisher was nothing short of beautiful. I got choked up. Thank you for honoring her. I miss her so much. I only wish she could have seen it herself. She’s such an inspiration.

-Good pacing. Nothing stagnates and there aren’t any subplots that feel extraneous like in Last Jedi. The film is focused on all the right areas.

-Kylo Ren fucking dies like he deserves. See ya later, Darth Fuckboi. But we’ll also discuss that below.

-The Han Solo cameo caught me waaaaaaaaaaay off-guard. Harrison Ford has made no bones about hating Han Solo, which annoys me because I still think Han is his best performance, and yet he still agreed to cameo, so that was pretty neat. Unexpected for sure. But I’m sure Disney waved a very pretty paycheck and he only had about 10 lines, so why not?

-I did like Rey’s adoption of the Skywalker name. Thank you for giving meaning to that strange title choice. It’s very heartwarming to end on that image of Luke and Leia, together again, smiling fondly at this little girl they adopted. She ended a war and now she can be herself. I loved her creating a gold lightsaber too. It’s very fitting and it’s such a great thing to see. As a female fangirl, it makes my heart sing to know that millions of little girls get to grow up with a female Jedi as the lead in the new franchise.

-It was nice to see Lando again! Good for Billy D.

Cons:

I have three big fucking problems with this movie. They don’t break the entire movie, but they damage it so much that now I get why the movie is getting so many mixed reviews. The things this movie does well, it does well, but the things it fucks up? My God, does it fuck them up. Let’s dig in.

-First huge problem: *gets out loud speaker* KYLO FUCKING REN DID NOT DESERVE A FUCKING REDEMPTION ARC. FUCK. THIS. FUCKING. FUCKBOI. HE DOES NOT DESERVE A REDEMPTION ARC BECAUSE HE IS A GODDAMN MOTHERFUCKING SPACE NAZI AND HIS ACTIONS DO NOT AT ALL WARRANT A KISS FROM REY NOR FORGIVENESS FROM ANYONE. FUCK DARTH FUCKBOI. FUCK ANYONE WHO THINKS HE COULD BE REDEEMED AFTER KILLING HIS FATHER IN COLD BLOOD AND TRYING TO KILL HIS MOTHER AND OH YEAH REMEMBER THE BILLIONS OF DEAD INNOCENT PEOPLE HE KILLED AS A PART OF THE FIRST FUCKING ORDER OH MY GOD THIS IS THE WORST WRITING HOW FUCKING DARE YOU.

Ahem.

This arc did not work in the Last Jedi either and yet here we fucking are. We are in a world that is asking us to forgive a goddamn Space Nazi. It’s so unacceptable. But I shouldn’t be surprised, since this is the same fucking year Hollywood is trying to ask me to feel bad for the goddamn fucking Joker.

Kylo Ren does not and never will deserve a fucking redemption arc. He willfully slaughtered billions of people. Billions. Fuck you for asking me to care about him. Fuck you for that disgusting kiss. He is an abuser and Rey has not shown any romantic interest in him whatsoever up until this point. I can’t fucking believe they pandered to the fucking gross ass Reylo fans. And yes, fight me, I don’t care, Reylo is fucking problematic as hell and that was the most forced bullshit I’ve ever seen in my life. Go to hell.

-Second huge problem: retconning Rey’s backstory made me fucking furious. It was the one fucking thing I didn’t want J. J. to mess with and not only did he mess with it, he went with the most illogical fucking method to make Rey’s lineage “important.” Say what you want about the Last Jedi but the thing that worked best was Rey’s parents being fucking nobodies who sold her off. That was a great story element. It reinforces the very important idea that you are who you choose to be, to quote the immortal words of The Iron Giant. Where you came from does not fucking matter. Your blood does not matter. You are the person that you want to be and that’s how you should live your life, with choices that are important to who you are, not where you came from. They backtracked just to pay lip service to the originals for no reason and because they got too scared to color outside of the lines.

-Third huge problem: Palpatine’s retconned inclusion in the story. There is no way you can convince me that old ass Palpatine crawled on top of a woman and made a baby. It does not fit at all. It’s just stupid, stupid crap and I hate it with my entire soul. I want to slap whoever the hell wrote it. Not only does the Palpatine bullshit make no narrative sense, it’s a straight up retconned bullshit plothole. I defer to the experts, but from what I remember, there was no indication he was still alive in the previous films. It overshadows what was a promising story and it derails so much for her fucking character to have this useless lineage garbage that doesn’t work on any level. There was no reason to crawl back to Palpatine when Last Jedi felt as if it was leading towards Kylo fulling stepping into the Big Bad role and Rey rejecting his stalker, abusive shit to be the Jedi she wanted and needed to be.

-Continuing the “maybe Rey is secretly evil” bullshit from the last movie. I hated this in Last Jedi too. Rey shows absolutely no signs of being evil. Ever. At most, she loses her temper, but that’s it. Normal good people can lose their temper. The movie constantly keeps saying maybe she’s bad but her actions are universally good, kind, brave, and helpful, so why the hell did they pursue this nonsense at all? It’s clear that Rey is virtuous. The First Order has done nothing but oppress her and kill innocent people, so why the hell would she ever entertain the thought of joining them? It’s so pointless. The only time it even made a little sense was when Palpatine said she could save her friends by commanding the Final Order and even then it was a fucking stretch. Christ, I hate it when the writing is forcing something that does not match the character’s actions. Good job with the Force vision, by the way. Every single non-stupid person knew it was going to be a Force vision when we saw it in the trailer, you cliché bastards. They were wasting everyone’s time with this and they should be ashamed of themselves.

-Not going anywhere with Finn telling Rey how he felt. Finn in general was still sort of not as important overall as I want him to be, but we’ll see if that changes if their stories continue past the Skywalker saga. Either way, the attention has constantly been shifted away from Finn and Rey and it’s very frustrating because their friendship is so endearing. Whether you ship it or not, it’s an important relationship and I wish they had spent more time on it instead of having him fret after her constantly. Sigh.

I probably need to keep marinating on this film. There’s a lot to drink in. As I said, I’m not sure how I feel, since the good is really good, but the bad is really bad. It feels like it’s not good enough for a B grade, but it’s better than a C grade, like I need a letter between these two. It could’ve been done so much better, but it also could have been done much worse. I definitely like it better than Last Jedi, but it’s not exactly good either. It’s a trouble film. It’s a fun film. It’s just…a lot of things. I would say that the scale makes it satisfying as a closing statement to the saga, but not for the individual characters. Rey’s derailment due to Darth Fuckboi is a huge disservice, so while I think people are overreacting, I get why they’re angry at the film, especially for the three things I noted. It truly seems to be a film split right down the center in terms of good/bad. That’s all I can say for now.

#rise of skywalker #the rise of skywalker #star wars #movie review #film review #spoilers #spoiler alert

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whenimgoodandready · 5 years

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Adrienette, Lukanette, Adrienette, Lukanette, Adrienette, Lukanette, Adrienette, Lukanette, Adrienette, Lukanette, Adrienette, Lukanette, Adrienette, Lukanette, ADRIENETTE! LUKANETTE! ADRIENETTE! LUKANETTE! IDK!? STOP BADGARING ME FANDOM!!! Even Marinette is indecisive about it! She’s just a dumb teenager who doesn’t know what she wants!..........does she?

*Desperada-Marinette and the girl squad were hangin’ out at Julekas house boat listening to Kitty Section rehearse and Marinette and Luka get cozy with each other. It also looks to be that the squad is starting to jump onboard with the Lukanette ship. Well, Adrienette isn’t goin’ anywhere so how much longer are they gonna support something that hasn’t even set sail yet!? Adrien and Kagami show up (having ditched fencing practice) and Marinette quickly leaves Lukas side to not give Adrien the impression she likes Luka. Oh, Marinette, what are we gonna do with you? She even says they’re “just friends” too🤨.

Jagged Stone arrives and he tries to get Juleka and Lukas mother back into the band cuz they had “history”. Oh! Thing is, he fired his guitarist, Vivica, and now he’s looking for a new one. Hmmmm, a new guitarist? Like, someone who knows rock n’ roll? And who’s young and talented? Marinette knows a guy like that! IIIIIIt’s Lu-Adrien!? Whomp! Whomp! Whomp! 🤦‍♀️. Marinette WTF!? Adrien is a classical pianist! I highly doubt he’s strummed a guitar! She knows damn well Luka is a better fit and yet she’s still trying to give Adrien hints she wants him! Okay, Marinette, I know how much you want Adrien, but you can’t just ignore talent when you see it from Luka.

Just then, Vivica shows up in her akumatized form calling herself Desperada! OOOOOH! So she’s that mysterious villainess I saw in “Gamer 2.0”! Well, thanks for the closure! (I’m talking to you person in charge of episode scheduling 😑). Desperada, I like that name, reminds me of a Rihanna song. Thing is, it’s more like a Western name and she didn’t really look “Western”. I mean, she kinda did with the whole musical skeleton make-up look, which is pretty cool, but nothing really “Wild Wild West” to me. It was more like something outta “The Book of Life” or “Coco” with that sugar skull thing. I’m a little fan of westerns where there’s a female outlaw that’s why. Her powers were using any instrument like a gun to capture people in her guitar case with a pic of them appearing on it as a sticker. Let’s just say if she wasn’t a musician, she’d make a bada** sniper!

Anyways, Desperada captures everyone except the love triangle kids and Ladybug is given the lucky charm to bring in extra help from Master Fu again using the snake miraculous! The snake miraculous!? OOOOOH! We saw who that was! (“Party Crasher”), some people in the fandom were right about it too! And now, ladies and gentlemen, the holder of the snake miraculous, (drum roll) Luk(trumpets begin to sound)-ADRIEN!? AGAIN!? (trumpets die out). WTF!? WHY!? Okay, I get it, he did save Luka when Desperada almost got him and as we know, Marinette/Ladybug doesn’t know Adriens Cat Noir, but still! Adrien agrees to it thinking he’ll win over Ladybug in a new superhero form since this time, she knows who he is and becomes “Aspik”...........(turns to the trumpeteers) you guys can sound I guess, (trumpets sound, but not enthusiastically). Okay, thank you.

So um, the snake miraculous is a bracelet of a snake swallowing itself, a Kwami snake like being named Sass (remember him from “Sandboy”!? He’s kinda like the leader of the Kwamies), a harp weapon and its power is “Second Chance” where they can go back a few minutes in time by turning the snake head on their bracelet back and it’s not a one hit power! It can go on as many times until the snake head gets to the end! It’s almost like Bunnyxs power except hers is more serious and can go back (and fourth) many times and it’s more fragile. Huh, I always thought the snake miraculouses power would be hypnotism, but I’m thinking too much “Jungle Book” here (what do snakes have to do with time travel!?). That’s cool! So it’s just Ladybug and Aspik vs. Desperada. It. went. TERRIBLE! Ladybug kept getting captured again and again and again and again and again AND AGAIN! And do you know why!? Cuz Aspik over here was too busy trying to woo Ladybug and not focusing on defeating the bad guy! That’s why!

ENOUGH! Adrien quits cuz he’s had it with being a f**king failure as it’s been 25,913 times! 25,913 TIMES!? 25,913 TIMES!? 25,913 TIMES!? 25,913 TIMES!? DAMN ADRIEN! YOU SUCK! Ladybug finally sees she’s wrong again! So Adrien suggests Luka take the miraculous instead. HALLELUJAH! Ladies and gentlemen, the real holder of the snake miraculous, Viperion, a.k.a. Luka Couffaine! (trumpets sound and end with a big finish!). Now this guy, this guy! Does a hell of a better job than “Aspik” did and it only took him a few tries! Humph!

I apologize for my wild outbursts there, I’m a very passionate writer and I speak what others are afraid to say. I’m like a voice for the people. I’m sure that’s what all of you were probably thinking way in the back of your heads there about the plot that occurred in the episode. I’ve settled down now and I’ll explain more. Ahem, first off, the girl squad are now leaning towards the Lukanette ship cuz they’re probably sick and tired of all the Adrienette nonsense and want something new. More importantly, they think this ship better since Marinette is more comfortable with Luka and how he’s more liberated than the sheltered Adrien. Fair point. The character Vivica/Desperada was based off a fan who won a contest at comic con and was originally supposed to be a veterinarian until they changed it to a guitarist (she looked so cute!). I heard about that, they also said she was supposed to be a fan of Cat Noir and was upset that he wasn’t getting as much recognition as Ladybug. It would’ve been nice cuz according to my Love Chart (which I legit have), nobody and I mean NOBODY likes Cat Noir, so cut him some slack and give him at least one fangirl! C’mon! Adrien failed at being the snake miraculous holder, but it’s not because he sucked (25,913 TIMES!? That’s like 3 months!), but it’s cuz there was no black cat hero to assist Ladybug! It was just Ladybug and Aspik and no Cat Noir! I thought they would’ve realized by now that they can’t defeat the villain unless it’s both of ‘em (plus a third or fourth party if necessary) to stop ‘em! Sure Ladybug defeated Style Queen by herself, but at least she had a “black cat” like someone there to help! It has to be Ladybug and Cat Noir! Good luck/Bad luck, Yin/Yang! That’s the idea! The reason why they didn’t see that was cuz they were both blinded by love! Marinette/Ladybug mostly picked Adrien to be the snake miraculous holder cuz she thought, “OMG! I’m gonna be fighting crime with my crush!” and Adrien/Cat Noir said yes cuz he thought, “Maybe she’ll love me this time if she knows who I am!” :P. Even Plagg thought it was a bad idea cuz he knew they needed Cat Noir and they weren’t even focused on Desperada and just trying to court each other! You’d think Marinette/Ladybug would’ve listened to her own words about Adrien being a distraction in her life (“Chameleon”). Speaking of courting, during one of Aspiks failed Second Chances, he confessed to Ladybug that he was Cat Noir (cuz she knows he’s Adrien as Aspik) and we only see a brief look of shock on her face before she’s captured again. Wonder what was quickly goin’ through her head at that point? Flashbacks of all her moments with him as himself and Cat and how she acted like both herselves in front of ‘em realizing how stupid she’s been? Lol! The shocks gonna be more wilder when it happens though and I’ll be there to see it. Ladybug really should’ve picked Luka first cuz at least he was bold enough to step in and distract Desperada to save Ladybug like he did as Viperion. Poor Adrien though, now he’s gonna think his Lady is too incompetent to be a hero. Well, not a “snake” hero at least, but a different animal hero if only she knew. The problem is Marinette is indecisive. She doesn’t know what she wants which is why she can’t choose between Adrien and Luka. Tikki and Kagami can see that and the latter even points out how Marinette needs to make up her mind already! Actually, according to the Season 3 canon episode order, this is actually the start of the mid episodes which means things won’t get more complicated ‘til the end. Especially when the last few episodes are more focused on the love issues. Currently, we’re dealing with plot right now, but we’ll eventually get there.

#miraculous ladybug #desperada #miraculous ladybug desperada

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dafukdidiwatch · 5 years

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REVIEWING TIME TRAVELING BABIES

Right, so, I have now complete understanding (hopefully) over the progression of the Universes that have popped up. Alpha-Jegus->Karkat->John->Jane. I got that.

I also got that the Reset just changed the time/location the babies were originally going to. Pre-Reset, the babies would have gone into the past and grown up to the gang we all know and love. Post-Reset, they would have gone to a different dimension in different locations and turn into the Alpha-Verse.

So that means John (our boy john) was the one to create ALL the babies, and ALL 8 sets of both Alpha and Beta-verse.

And since each baby didn’t launch yet without a gift/present, let’s see where each of those things ended up.

JANE

She got the hat. In Beta-Verse, she didn’t really much wear the hat (seeing how most of the time she is a ghost).

But in Alpha-Verse, Jane uses the hat as a way of expressing her interest in Detectives. Mean that hat went through an explosive landing and time, but still has ink splots on from when Beta-Dad went through Skaia.

JAKE

He got the Guns.

in Beta-Verse, he grew up to be Harley, named after his dog. He had duel-Pistols, which he used to accidentally kill the Colonel. Baby Jade was messing with them, prompting Tavros to move the guns away from her, and killing Harley instead.

In Alpha-Verse, Jake just has the guns and his weapon of choice are the guns.

DAVE

Dave got Maplehoof. He stole Rose’s birthday present.

In Beta-Verse, his baby ass killed her gift (the bastard) and Bro just made it into a leather bib for some fucking reason.

Alpha-Verse, yeah we haven’t really seen the original Maplehoof, just this tiny version of it. So my theory is that Maplehoof died again in Alpha-Verse, and Dave grew up, wanted to replicate that, and just used his vast wealth to create a tiny-ass version of Maplehoof, like what happened in Spy Kids 2.

ROXY

So this one is a bit easy. Mutant Mew-Mew was created by Rose, taken in game by Rose, and John ended up with her. Given to baby Roxy.

In Beta, this was probably the thing that inspired he to be a scientist, to find the secrets of the 4 eyed cat and study with her super secret science lab underground. And honestly? It is probably the same cat, so I guess it lives eternal, unless Beta-Roxy makes a new cat every so often.

In Alpha.....

I think we know her love of cats...and science

JOHN

John got a book, specifically, John got the book that his ghost-grandma signed.

So original history was John had a non-signed version of the book, took it with him, Ghost-Grandma wrote a message, dropped it down for John to find the book in the Ecto-room, and for baby John to crawl on it.

From there it killed grandma, but Beta-Dad found said book and kept it in his safe. Which John opened and has currently.

In Alpha-Verse, John crashed with the book. Was raised as a comedian pro, kept this book as an heirloom, which was passed down from generation to generation along with his body, until it was in Jane’s house all her life.

DIRK

God, GOD! Fuck this puppet, you are Fucking Eternal and I hate you.

So, if I get this fucking right.......Gamzee gave Dave nightmares and he got haunted by Cal. Dream-Cal was picked up by Cop-Guy, and floated his way to the Ecto-Room to be with Dirk.

In Beta-Verse, Cal went back in time to Dirk, where Dirk took, loved, cherish, used to raise/beat up Dave, used to fight Jack on Prospit, where Jack stole Cal, took with him when ransacking the Trolls, sent back in time to Aradia, re-suited in a green suit, for the Troll’s Black Queen to ecto-create a brand-new fucking Scratch (hate that guy still), and Gamzee currently has it.

Alpha-Verse, Dirk was raised with Cal. I have no idea why Alpha-Dave didn’t burn it when Dirk came crashing in, but whatever. Dirk loves the bastard, and I do not.

See, I got a theory. You know how poltergeist could fuck with people by like doing demonic whispering and leading them to the dark side in movies? Yeah, I 100% agree with Anti-Jegus that Cal is Bad Juju. Gamzee made it out of anger/rage, so it became evil. A fucking Swag-Bag of evil.

I 100% believe that Cal did like, secret evil dark whisperings of “you should go kill” “killing is fun, totally, all the cool kids do it.” Not to say Gamzee didn’t also just went nuts from withdrawl and just wanted to kill, but he had Cal encouraging it because Cal is t r a s h.

So, Cal is now loose in Alpha-Verse, and I am just Waiting for the next victim of Cal’s Bad Juju Dark Spirit Shit.

(SIDEBAR: please fund me on Patreon so I can get enough money to make my own Cal Effigy and just burn the bastard)

Finally, RABBIT

Yeah, THESE GUYS. The Rabbit has a Long Fucking History, doesn’t it?

Dave bought Con Air Rabbit. Gave it to John for his birthday.

John, in a moment of Con Air Purity, Gave that Rabbit to Rose.

Rose grew up with the rabbit, but it was torn. So with John’s gift of Knitting-Supplies, she reknitted it to send to John on the same Birthday.

(So John had 2 rabbits at the same time)

During the Same “Con Air Purity” Moment, John gave that Rabbit to Jade.

Jade grew up with that rabbit, and for months (somehow) kept sending it Back and Forth with Jake (again....somehow!) to improve it.

Resulting in Liv, John’s current Rabbit, who helped him deliver the Bomb to both Rose and Dave to kill (but actually create) The Green Sun.

The long Complex life of Beta-Rabbit.

And it changes in Apha-Verse.

So, Dave gives rabbit to John, who gives it to Baby Rose. In Alpha, rabbit just stays as a rabbit. Given to Roxy, who dresses it as a Wizard and given to Jane for her birthday.

With this rabbit, Dave->John->Beta Baby Rose-> John -> Baby Jade. Only this time, baby Jane goes to Alpha-Land, passed down to Jake, who dressed it up and gave to Jane for the same birthday.

Meaning that Lil Seb

Is just another Con Air Rabbit turned to Cyborg, only with more of a shortcut, than what happened with Liv.

#dafukblog #homestuck #act6 int2 #hs226 #analysis

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drkoestersmithrpg · 4 years

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OMG - the things I accomplished today.

Remember how you wrote Victoria’s Secret and then suddenly you just had this damn long plot in your head you had to weave together??? Tony’s Story was just supposed to be a repeat of Peter’s Story, but with what was going on In Tony’s Head when the dance happened.

And then..............there was.

Dammit nearly 10K words and we haven’t even gotten to when Peter went down with the helicopter - but I hope that will be short.

Tony’s Story Chapter 2

But dammit he should have let Pepper take him to bed with Maria in the next room because his skinhunger was getting bad. Very bad. He could tell, because every time Peter touched him he lit up like a Christmas Tree.

And he was touching Peter too much – he knew it. Putting his hands on the boy’s waist to move him out of the way of the holotable instead of just walking around him. Accenting his point by putting both hands on Peter’s shoulders and shaking him back and forth. Hugging him every damn time they made a technological breakthrough – or whenever he left on a trip – or whenever he left at the end of the day.

Dammit no wonder the boy started kissing him on the mouth.

* * *

As much as he wanted to bitch and moan and wax Shakespearian about his life, he really could be counting his blessings. Peter brightened up the room whenever he walked in it – and he was walking in it a lot. He was such a normal feature in Stark Tower, both in the living area and in the lab, that Tony was beginning to miss him when he wasn’t there. He had his own corner of the refrigerator. He had a lot of access to FRIDAY for food delivery and music options. He kept a change of clothes there. Despite the fact that he was full-time at Columbia and still the Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man, he still made time for Tony. And that made life good.

And if Tony started to worry that he was demanding too much of the kid’s time? Well there were always business trips or Avenger business to take him out of town for a while. That kept him busy. Busy was his safety net. Busy was good.

Then that day happened and Tony saw his fragile safety net begin to denigrate and that was very, very bad.

That day – the day Tony thought of as The Day Of The Slowdance. That day.

He had literally sat in his lab for an hour, spinning around in a swivel chair, trying to think of something to occupy his time. He had nothing. Nothing inspired. Once again he was diving into the tech, only to realize the tech had rejected him too. He was seriously thinking about drinking – dammit it was 2:00 in the afternoon, when he suddenly texted Peter and asked him to come by to help him with some suit issues “that have me stumped.” It was a lie of course, but by the time Peter got there he could trust his brain with something that Peter could work on. Then, when Peter’s brain started working, his brain would start working to.

Not since Bruce had Tony been with such a perfect lab partner, had worked with someone who just got it? But for all Bruce’s brilliance, they were both exited about different fields. When those two fields overlapped, they were magic together.

With Peter it was magic all the time.

He barely had to explain something to Peter before he was off and running with it.

The kid had all of his brilliance with none of his flaws. Sure, experience and education was missing. That was expected. But Peter got him. He followed exactly where Tony’s brain was headed without even having to be told. Tony had worked with people in college, obviously. And in his early days at SI, he’d led teams of engineers. Tony described it to Peter in terms of a root canal (And Peter agreed, he had the same problems in study groups and college lectures that were just too damn slow.)

Waiting for them to catch up… expecting them to be able to extrapolate where he was going from where he’d been…just having to stop and explain why his brain had gone in that direction…there was none of that with Peter. They worked together like they were two parts of a whole. That was good. That made life good.

But something was off that night. First, Peter showed up early. His last class, he explained, was all reading the text and passing the tests. That meant Tony hadn’t really had time to come up with the excuse for needing him in the lab, so he tried to keep him in the kitchen, talking about random things.

Peter had been in a great mood when he arrived, cheerful and eager and… were those a pair of faded-in-all-the-right-places skinny jeans? Peter was dressing up these days. Probably showing off for the hot nerdy girls that had Columbia had hiding somewhere.

Or hot boys. Peter had mentioned that, casually. Tony had been trying to ignore that fact.

But then they were in the lab, and Tony had to make due.

“This fucking joint in my helmet. Sorry, language.” Peter laughed at the inside joke. “This has been a problem since the Mark II prototype. Here.” Tony pointed to a crescent shaped scar on the right side of his neck. “Only on this side. Only right here,” he said, improvising randomly. “There is no way that the nanotech should be pinching there.”

Peter looked at the projection on Tony’s holotable, then looked closely at the scar on Tony’s neck (and if Tony took that moment to close his eyes and breathe in Peter’s scent? No one needed to know.)

Then he was back at the projection on the holotable, looking intently for a problem that didn’t exist (and if Tony took those few moments to check out the view of Peter’s jeans from behind? No one needed to know.)

Peter’s mouth twisted adorably as he tried to puzzle out the problem that didn’t exist. “So we’re looking for something small – just a clump – maybe not big enough to cause the snag in the retraction process for anyone else, but you’re sensitive to it enough to notice.”

“Unless…..” Peter began. “What if you’ve been experiencing that for so long… Could you have accidentally programmed it in, believing it to be a part of the suit? A feature not a flaw?”

“Huh,” Tony responded. It was better than letting his jaw hang open in silence. Leave it to Peter to solve a problem that wasn’t even there.

They worked on various aspects of the retraction for an hour or so, passing projections over to each other’s workstations (although Peter kept insisting on working on the original at Tony’s station, claiming it had better resolution and there wasn’t a delay. Which was bullshit, but so was the ‘delay’ they were working on so who was Tony to complain?)

Tony tried to relax and let the inspiration come – any minute now Peter would say something that would give him an idea and then they would have something real to work on – but it wasn’t happening.

Mostly because Peter kept trying to change the subject.

Every other question seemed not to be about what the tech but about his personal life. Tony deflected, of course. He was the uncontested pro at deflection. Especially when the kid seemed to be pressing him for info on topics he was actively trying to forget about. So what was the deal with Pepper and Maria, really? And what the deal with that Sanjay guy? Wasn’t he just living one floor down, or something? And what was up with that wedding?

“Break!” Tony announced suddenly, and headed toward the kitchen.

“Let’s eat. Then I’ll put on the suit. Slow the enclosure process down and have FRIDAY record it. You can watch the snag happen.”

“This isn’t all bad,” he said as they arrived in the kitchen. At least ___________________

At that Peter called out “Yes! Success! Time to celebrate! FRIDAY play some dance music!” and the next thing Tony knew “Ride On” was playing and he had an armful of Peter Parker.

Peter’s head was, mercifully, leaning on his chest, so the boy couldn’t see him standing stiffly, dumbfounded. He danced with Peter, of course, it seemed the polite thing to do. His hand was on Peter’s waist, but that was ok, he had touched Peter there before. But is OTHER hand now contained a handful of Peter’s hand, and for some absurd reason, in that moment, that touch struck him as beyond intimate. No wonder he gaped. All this time he had conned the boy into thining there was a problem with his suit and the entire time Peter had been planning…..what exactly?”

Which is why, when Peter smiled up at him, all he could do was stare and say “What are you doing, Kid?”

What are you doing kid? He asked.

“What does it look like I’m doing?” Peter had asked, sounding innocent.

Tony’s mouth was so dry he couldn’t speak, so he only shrugged.

The pain in Peter’s eyes hurt Tony to the quick, hurt him so badly he wanted to pull the boy’s head close again, hold him and apologize. But the kid covered it well, and before he could act, the look was gone.

And now Peter was smiling.

“Then I’ll just have to keep doing it until you figure it out.”

Tony pulled him close.

He kept his hand on the center of Peter’s back (safely away from Peter’s ass, dammit, he was going to be a gentleman about this.) He pressed the boy’s body against his own until he could feel Peter’s heartbeat hammering in his chest.

Oh no, wait, that was just him. He laid his chin on Peter’s head and held on for dear life.

And still they kept dancing.

In that moment – for maybe two minutes or more – Tony could see it. He could see it all, and it was so beautiful.

Moving Peter into a room in Stark Tower (not into the Penthouse itself, they had to keep up appearances. At least until Peter graduated.) Or better yet, just buying a building close to Columbia and creating a new lab. The lower levels would be tech libraries and a Gen Z coffee shop where Peter could hang out with his college friends, the top level would be their penthouse where they would sleep in each other’s arms every night. Tony would sleep normal hours, waking in the morning to make Peter breakfast before classes, puttering in the lab and having dinner ready when Peter came home. Keeping his schedule flexible so it could change every semester, sitting down at the dinner table and having FRIDAY coordinate their schedules, Winter Breaks, Spring Breaks, Summer Breaks. They would spread them out on a holocalendar shining in the air, pointing out long unscheduled 3-day weekends they would spend in Paris. Peter would study on the plane and Tony would make him omelets.

And it would be Peter. It would be all Peter. Peter would be the reason he remembered to eat, remembered to sleep. All so he could remind Peter to eat and sleep. He would take care of himself so he could take care of Peter. He would worry about Peter during long overnight study sessions with friends, and Peter would worry about him when he left on business trips, they would text each other ‘I miss yous’ and ‘I love yous’ and when they returned to each other….

…they would dance in Tony’s kitchen just like this.

Clutching Peter’s hand in his own Tony separated their bodies for a moment, holding Peter out at the end of his arm, spinning him under it, then scooping him back up in that tender embrace and putting his chin back on Peter’s head. Peter moved his face closer and Tony sighed, resting his lips against Peter’s forehead. It was perfect. It was heaven.

He could see it all – the years of impatiently waiting for Peter to graduate. The arguments, both petty and profound. The inevitable butting of heads when two fiercely independent people tried to live in the same place. The broken promises, dates missed because of last-minute study sessions, extra long business meetings. Harsh words, sometimes ridiculous, sometimes eye-opening, the tender intense make-up conversations afterwards. The makeup sex. The roses that came with apologies.

He was actually wondering if FRIDAY could tell him which florists delivered the fastest – would Peter object to having flowers delivered to him in class? Would a florist deliver roses to Columbia? Because he could almost here the arguments now, the arguments they would be having as Peter got tense and testy as he prepared to graduate. Arguments that were mostly about nothing, but were really all about the alarming prospect of the future. Arguments that Tony could tell (although he would never point out) were really about this young fledgling longing to spread his wings, to take his first flight, to leave the nest…..

Because that is exactly what Peter would want to do.

Because the boy in his arms, the boy 30 years his junior, the boy slow-dancing with him now, looked at him as a Father Figure. And Father Figures, even the ones you have sex with, even the ones you get naked with, even those Father Figures had to be shed by young men fighting to become independent.

Tony’s heart started pounding again.

As absurd as it was, he could hear it. The argument. The argument with the In-3-Years-Peter, the so-near-to-graduation-he-could-taste-it-Peter. That arguing Peter had angry eyes and a furloughed forehead and he was trying not to raise his voice but he was, and Tony was too, and they were shouting at each other, and anyone listening in would think that they were arguing over Tony’s too-long business trips, or maybe his too-short business trips, or else it was Peter’s too-long study sessions (with that lab partner that Peter fought with constantly and complained about constantly but now was suddenly singing the praises of now that the project was nearly complete) and anyone listening in would certainly have thought the whole argument could have been settled by an apology and more roses but Tony would know, Tony would know in his bone-marrow that this was Peter needing to spread his wings, to establish his independence, to leave the nest.

Because what do boys do when they graduate from college?

They leave home.

Peter, the real Peter, the Peter in his arms, was looking up at him, was waiting for a kiss. Tony could do that. Tony could kiss him and lead him into the other room and gently work him out of his pants and sink into him and come deep inside him and declare his true love, oh yes, Tony could do that.

Tony didn’t.

The song ended, and Tony clutched Peter’s hand in his own. He separated their bodies and held Peter out at the end of his arm. Peter willingly spun under it, trusting.

And when Peter’s back was turned Tony let go of his arm and walked out of the room.

“FRIDAY play disco,” he called out, never looking back.

--------------------------------chapter break---------------------------

Did he hide like a coward in his lab, waiting breathlessly for FRIDAY to confirm that Peter had left? Oh yes he did.

Did he pack a bag and leave that night for LA on some feigned business trip? Oh yes, he most certainly did.

Did he stop inviting Peter over to work in the lab on projects real and imagined, and did he make damn sure that there were always people in Stark Tower when Peter did show up? Oh most certain this was the case. Tony could be one damn popular guy when wanted to be. And that’s why weeks passed before he had to deal with an armful of Peter again.

He acted casual during those times inbetween, but inwardly he was frantic. This is ok, this is ok, he kept telling himself. “Yes I just broke up with Spider-Man, and yes, it hurts. But loosing the kid after only one slow-dance, that’s a pain I can bear, right?”

He kept repeating the mantra to himself as a week passed, and then another. But then he got lonely for the Kid and might have accidentally allowed him in the tower when he was alone.

“We’re not going to do this, Kid,” Tony said, when that alone time terned into a tender embrace. “We’re not going to do this, Kid,” he said even as he wrapped his arms around Peter and held him close. He had only let his guard down just for a second and the Kid swooped in, superhero that he was.

“Why not?” Peter asked, logically, and Tony opened his mouth to tell the whole Graduating From Columbia story but it was too big to come out.

He tried to talk about what Peter deserved, but he got cut off.

“You let me decide what I deserve.”

So he tried to tell the truth – or at least part of the truth. He did love Peter’s crush, loved it? For a while he was living for it. But suggesting that this was a legitimate reason to say no now just earned him a sweet kiss on his face, and then on the corner of his mouth.

The self-control that it took to not move the quarter inch and taste that boy for himself was agonizing.

Then the boy left, and Tony hung his head in shame.

He had told the boy no,

But the boy probably had trouble believing him when he had said “No” while holding a handful of Peter’s ass.

He forced himself to act casual, even as the kid walked away, even as his heart was hammering frantically in his chest. This is ok, this is ok, he could hear the mantra forming in his head even now.. “Yes I just broke up with Spider-Man, and yes, it hurts. But loosing the kid after only one slow-dance, and one handful of ass, that’s a pain I can bear, right?”

There was a second mantra, one that formed in his head as his private plane carried him away from New York City.

“You have the obvious advantage. Peter has the hard job, constantly waiting for you to be alone, constantly waiting to swoop in when you are unguarded. He’s the one who has to keep generating arguments why you should be together.. All you have to do is keep saying no.

But he didn’t say ‘no’ the next time Peter made a move on him, he said something much worse. A team of Avengers had returned from XXXXX and were debriefing in Stark Tower and Peter made an unexpected appearance. Tony was beyond grateful he was there – these group meetings ground on and made Tony angsty, but Peter made it easy to relax. They even had time to catch up, standing side by side and talking for quite a while while other Avengers fought for Tony’s attention.

But then the others began departing in various directions and Tony found himself absurdly fleeing from Peter, backing up as if the boy were going to mug him, grimacing, hating himself for grimacing.

“I’m not doing this!” Tony had whispered to him, fully aware that he had been doing it. Had stood shoulder to shoulder with Peter for the entire meeting. Had defended Peter to the group, had glowed when Peter defended him. Had nudged him when Fury said something particularly appalling, and shared an inside joke. More than one. He had been ‘doing this.’ He had been ‘doing this’ shamelessly.

He wanted to explain, he did, but the penthouse was full of people. Wanted to explain how he was sure he could bear the pain of breaking up with Peter after only one slow dance, after only one handful of ass. But breaking up with Peter after getting naked? Breaking up with Peter after Peter had met his idol and found him wanting? He tried to explain that there were pains he couldn’t bear.

That’s not what came out of his mouth, but it was close.

LYRICS TO 1000 YEARS

“Peter hacked into FRIDAY as….as a practical joke. Only he forgot to hack out,” Tony muttered to the remaining Avengers. He didn’t try to wrestle with FRIDAY in front of them. He knew Peter’s hacking skills. He had honed a few of them himself.

“So, did you two break up?” Nat asked, after the others had gone. He was standing out by the heliopad to get away from the condemning music.

“We were never dating.”

“Could have fooled me.”

“So you’re admitting you’re not very good at your job? Odd business strategy, RomannonfXXX.”

“Look, I know Anand marrying the Gay Jesus of India really rattled your cage…”

“…the Limp-dicked Gay Jesus of India…” Tony muttered.

“But I could have told you about Anand. I would have told you about Anand, if you had asked me. But you didn’t ask me…”

“I’m sorry, since when do I take dating advice from a master assassin?”

“I read people Tony. You used to read people too, but you missed that one. You fell for an object in motion – I’m sorry it came to a surprise to you that he moved on…”

“..you saw it coming.”

Nat shrugged.

“And Peter is an object in motion too, constantly motion,” Tony muttered, mostly to himself.

“Predictable motion, and right beside you. You can’t see yourself from the outside, Tony, I can. Feel free to tell me it’s none of my business,”

“It’s none of your business.”

“… but Peter works for you. You’re good together.”

“I’m sorry, were you….were you trained in this too? In addition to interrogation, did SHEILD use you as Yenta the Matchmaker? How is this your job?”

“SHIELD used me to know you, and I do. And for the record, you’ve been miserable for a while now. And it’s not good for the Avengers. The Avengers is my job.”

She left him, mercifully, alone after that. Alone in his empty home. Alone within walls echoing A THOUSAND YEARS XXXXX[lyrics]XXXXXXXx with the assurance that he [lyrics] xxxxxshouldn’t worryxxxxxxxxPeter had loved him for a thousand years.

The mission with Wanda to her old stomping grounds in Serbia offered up a welcome distraction. Demanding that Peter not be on the departing team was easy – it was a dangerous mission. “Good for him” or not, Tony didn’t want Peter in danger.

Armored in his suit he met Peter on a random rooftop to give him the news.

Tony winced when he thought of that day. He wasn’t proud of that day. He had determined to be outright cruel to Peter that day – as if he could ever be cruel to Peter. Still he tried to use the worst words he knew that day – the kinds of words he had hated so much when he was Peter’s age. Words like ‘childish’ and ‘adult thing to do.’ He was glad he had kept his helmet on. He couldn’t bear to look at the Kid directly.

Was he hyperventilating when he got back to the Tower? Oh yes he was. Did the angry voices shouting XXX[lyrics to she fucking hates me]XXXXXXXXXx at him as he tried to make his way to the lab fit his mood? Oh yes they did.

He didn’t fight with FRIDAY about the song. He fell in a slump against the wall, tears in his eyes. For an hour he remained there. He couldn’t remember ever feeling so lonely.

But he still had FRIDAY, and FRIDAY wanted to be good for him. For another hour they talked to each other, gently, until he finally had some access to Peter’s hack. Peter had effectively shut him out of volume control and the off button, but he hadn’t thought to shut out Tony from the playlist. Rather than try anying harder (which would have required Tony get up off the floor) Tony simply added songs to the list. Soon FRIDAY was playing “Ride On” at acceptable volume levels for the man slumped on the floor.

Did he jerk off to the song? Oh yes he did. He did, and he wasn’t ashamed. He did and he dreamed of how Peter felt in his arms as they danced; so strong, so solid, so willing. He came whispering Peter’s name.

Afterward he thumped his head on the back of the wall over and over again.

He tried remembering the mantras he had found before, but they had all dried up, and now the only one he could remember was “I can do this, I can do this, I can do this.”

He had the advantage.

Peter was smart, but Tony was more experienced. Peter wanted to get laid, but Peter was also surrounded by dozens of college boys who were not only cute but somewhat intelligent as well.

Besides, if they did have sex? Peter would expect him to take off his shirt, and that simply couldn’t happen.

“FRIDAY? Add one more to the playlist.”

And that’s how Tony Stark got up from the floor that next morning, packing his bags to Tom Petty’s “I Won’t Back Down.”

Tony knew he would have to get more creative after the mission in Serbia was over. The only reason something hadn’t happened that last day in the Tower was because other people were there. Peter was a lot stronger than Tony – oh god was Tony well aware of that fact – and as he had found out the first time Peter kissed his face, he had no control when Peter was in his arms. It was because he was so damn touchstarved, Tony argued to himself.

It was because he was so damn lonely.

It was because it was Peter.

#Serenity and Secrets #Enthusiasm #Desires

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killianmesmalls · 6 years

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FINALLY!!! My con recap is... long. And I’m wordy. And it’s long. BUT IT’S HERE! Below the cut for anyone who is crazy enough to read it all.

Friday:

By the time the weekend really got started, I had already had the chance to meet up with @lillpon Wednesday evening for a last-day-at-work happy hour and then again when she, @justmilah, and @fraddit came over to my place to hang out, watch Once, and put the totally last minute touches on my Tilly cosplay. (Also, BTW, yes I am using nicknames because 1) I figure it’s easier for people to follow along and 2) I don’t know how much some people want their real names to be attached to fellow crazies and sent into the ether.) We ended up venturing down to pick up the car from my father-in-law, and on the way found a meeting place for @queen-mabs-revenge to gather with us. Now, we couldn’t find her, kept checking to see where she might be, when LO, HERE COMETH A TINY ITALIAN IN A BIG MCFRIGGIN HAT. Yes, she was indeed sauntering down 8th Avenue in her Lt. Jones hat, which was probably the 18th weird thing most passing New Yorkers had seen in the two hours since they had woken up.

We then all tackle each other and me, @fraddit, @justmilah, and @queen-mabs-revenge continue on to meet my FIL for the car, where Mabs was super on board with helping him trek stuff from the trunk back to his apartment after seconds of meeting him. Such a polite. Without much ado, we make our way to the middle of friggin nowhere New Jersey, aided by the very comforting fact that Mabs navigates the way I need to be navigated to. Much thanks. Many appreciate. Wow.

Our first stop once we go around in circles a few times since driving in Whippany itself is a damn adventure was to meet up with @thesschesthair. While Mabs is confusing the front desk dude with her hat, Chesty over there gives us a call and I sneak out, lock eyes across the dingy parking lot of the Red Carpet Inn, by its derelict diner, and leap into her arms. She then comes over to attack Milah and Fraddit before properly grabbing Mabs so hard they were close to osmosis.

I’m not going to lie, it’s at this point through to Monday evening where things sort of blur. Mabs and Chesty requested rooms beside each other and GUESS WHAT. Yep, you guessed it, they had rooms that actually were connected by a door that was hidden behind Mabs’s oversized fridge. Oh! And there was a random toilet just hanging out outside their rooms. Because, why not? When Puh Pah has to go, he has to go. Also, it’s here that Mabs gives us all Alice-themed totes from Poundland (YES, LAUGH, IT’S GREAT) and then we do roundabouts again to get to the Marriott where the rest of us are staying.

Registration was a breeze, and then we collapse into the lounge area where we meet up with @theonceoverthinker and an already-registered Chesty, where she and I are off to the side making inappropriate jokes and then deciding it’s time to wine o’clock this con. Guys? The pub in the Marriott got some play by the Pirate Crew (thank you, @freifraufischer for dubbing us all as pirates), we tried their Poisoned Apple sangria, shot the shit, and then went about checking in and getting ourselves settled while at various points meeting up with @captregina, @lillpon, and @freifraufischer.

At some point (again because all is a blur) we went to Chris’s Q&A where I asked him a couple of questions and honestly blanked on most of the experience because OMFGITALKEDTOSMEE. Then Jared came on, was very much however you’d imagine Jared being, and I was still very much focused on Chris saying how much Smee would love Alice and knowing that Colin and Rose day was tomorrow.

Afterwards, we got autographs, where Mabs’s delightful totes came in handy and I had Gil, Chris, and Jared sign the back of the Alice tote. Gil was nice and I complimented Jared on how much him being open about anxiety meant to people, but it was Chris that, to me, was the MVP. He was incredibly personable, funny, and a total teddy bear. I asked him about the blooper he was in where it seemed like Smee was trying to convince Hook to not duel with Ahab (the one where Colin spat in his face) and Chris said he honestly forgot what was happening in that scene, but he would ask Colin. Still, the one thing he did remember was when he knelt down in front of Colin in the post-duel “Congratulations, Captain, you won!” scene, he split his pants. The camera was to his back, but his treasures were on full display in front of Colin.

I also asked Chris for a hug because, I mean, YOLO, and he obliged! Honestly, he’s a damn pumpkin and I adore him.

Now, there was karaoke night after this, but some of us were bad idea bears and decided to say “f--- this” and went into the pool with some sea salt gin Mabs had brought over. We’re super classy, guys.

...What happens at the pool, stays in the pool. :P

Saturday:

OMG COLIN AND ROSE DAY! COLIN AND ROSE DAY! COLIN AND ROSE DAY!

I was legit saying this and hopping up and down I don’t know how many times. I focused most of the morning trying to make sure I had myself together, getting my tights ripped just right, getting my hair done, venturing to @captregina’s room so I could do her hair (where I met @brave-lassie), doing her eyeliner, doing my makeup, meeting up with everyone, and trying to contain my feelings about COLIN AND ROSE DAY!!!

I missed most of the Wild Bunch Q&A in my efforts to get ready and in waiting for Rose’s photo ops. I lined up with Capt just by where the actors enter into the room they do the photo ops in and got my very first in-person look at Rose.

Guys.

GUYS.

That precious angel GLOWS. I cannot say enough how adorable and lovely she looks and is in person, but I will try my best. She’s insanely precious. Honestly, I was probably a walking hearteyes emoji. I try to keep my cool as I wait for her in line, where I’m set to get a picture with her than a shared picture with her and Capt, and the moment she sees me in my Tilly cosplay she exclaims, “NAILED IT!” Then, like a spastic idiot, I told her I couldn’t help myself since she’s my favorite, and she said, “You’re my favorite!” Bless her. She’s insanely personable and tilts her head to you, and is a personified cupcake.

After that, I brought Capt in for a shared picture with her, where we handed her my bunny mask and Rubik’s cube I had made with the help of Lill as we (plus Milah and Fraddit) had lounged on my couch Thursday night. She geeked out a bit over them, I asked her which one she wanted to hold, and she chose the Rubik’s cube, I held the mask, and Capt and I held a pillowcase she had gotten a while back that said, “We’re all mad here.”

Rapid fire they then did Colin and Chris photos followed by Colin and Rose, where all of us collectively lost our minds throughout. There are some pretty stellar ones people got with Colin and Chris, and then OMFG KNIGHTROOK.

Not going to lie, I kind of blanked on it a bit. I just remember saying “hi” to them both, taking a photo in the middle of them, and then ushering in PERFECT TACO HAT LT. JONES MCMABS in for the second photo, where I pulled a crazy face and she pulled that cheesy salute in that pic of him and Bernard.

Then was Rose’s Q&A, and as you can tell she’s still the embodiment of sunshine with a dash of silliness. I must have had a massive smile on my face the entire time in between bouts of laughter.

Before her panel ended, they called for Colin photos, which I needed to get to early because I had Rose’s meet and greet, but HELL NO WAS I MISSING ANY OF ROSE. Nope. So I stayed, then dashed out, and totally thought I’d be fine because…hey, I had already met and touched the man, how hard could this be?

BEING A NORMAL HUMAN AROUND HIM IS IMPOSSIBLE. I just hope I didn’t sound too much like an idiot when I said another hello and asked, “Do you mind if I give you a hug?”

Tired panda just opened his arms and we took a quick picture, and his face was SUPER CLOSE TO MINE and I didn’t know what to do with myself and suddenly that scruff was AGAINST MAH FACE. I think I entered a new plane of existence at some point but remembered I had feed and managed to use them to walk out and not completely venture to a new reality.

It was probably a good thing I didn’t have time to transcend to nirvana because ROSE’S MEET AND GREET WAS NEXT. It got off to a late start since Emilie was still in the room when we got up there, but I’d wait howmstever long for her.

SHE IS AN ANGEL. I mean, absolute, 100%, grade-A, undiluted angel. She makes an effort to engage with everyone and really make eye contact with you, speak to you for as much as she can, and is just naturally her sweet and funny self. She then took selfies with everyone, where I told her my name was “Carrie, like the movie” which is my default at Starbucks because then people know how to spell it. She fake scared and pretended like she was ducking her head and going to walk out, which we shared a laugh at before our picture.

I missed most of Karen David’s panel, but right afterward was COLIN!!! Tired panda did his best to wake up and be his silly, smartass self, bless his heart. I’m so glad he said he wished there were more to the KnightRook story because he feels like there’s more to explore with that and HARD AGREE, COL! Also massive, MASSIVE shoutout to Overthinker for her crazy awesome questions!!! You are indeed worthy of being his favorite!!! Also, props to @the-girl-in-the-band-tshirt for her original question about craft services. Dudes, the things we don’t think about!!! I need to try a grilled cheese with pickles now, that sounds AMAZING. OH! OH!!! AND HE DID THE WORM! AND SANG! How were we this #blessed?!?!

We then had a hot minute (or roughly 30) before KNIGHTROOK PANEL!!! Guys, those two and their dynamic will never not kill me. THOSE TWOOOOOOO!!!! HOW PERFECT ARE THEY?!?! I think their humor together is priceless and she’s like a damn coffee bean to him. It’s a good thing I like odd things because I CAN’T EVEN WITH THEM. (:smirk:) AS IF THAT WEREN’T ENOUGH he goes and kills us with his Millian answer and I see Mabs and Milah vibrating into the ether.

After that is almost immediately autographs, where they had us line up for Colin then head over to Rose. They tucked tired panda behind this black curtain, and Mabs, Capt, and I coordinated getting various things signed for us and others. When I told him something was for someone who had contributed to the Whitecaps charity, he replied, “Oh! Very good.” Then he got my spyglass and went all childishly curious, peeked inside the box, then raised his eyebrow and gave me a smirk.

Then it was off to see Rose, who was taking more time to talk to fans, which is understandable given the fact that Colin had a longer line and Rose also can’t seem to help herself. Chesty gave me her badge so I could get a second autograph, like a friggin champ, and I had Rose sign the spyglass and also had the title page of the manuscript I’ve written (I NEED TO FINISH EDITING IT) and told her it was a 1920s Alice in Wonderland retelling, and I thought having her sign it would be a good luck charm. She sounded super enthusiastic about it and wrote a long note for me on it, which I will for sure cherish forever!!!

OH! And on my way to get into the Rose line, I hear someone say my name and LO AND BEHOLD, IT’S @leiandcharles!!! HUZZAH!!! I probably sounded like a spaz because I was on a Colin and Rose high and was all over the place but she pretended to not be terrified of the insanity that was me… ANYWAY!

It was then time for dinner. With the pub PACKED TO THE GILLS, especially after there was a bomb scare at a nearby hotel so the people there had to come over to ours for a bit, a group of us went up to Capt’s room to hang out and get pizza. I’m probably going to blank on everyone that was in that room, but I do remember dragging Leia there, meeting @coaldustcanary, Overthinker kicking over my drink and being roasted about it by Chesty (still makes me giggle!), and generally being a nuisance with Capt, Mabs, and Milah while Fraddit, and Lill went off to introduce Chesty to Chipotle. It has since changed her life.

At some point we declare we should hang out at the pub again, and a group of us went to go shoot the shit until Mabs passed out right there in the booth (CALLIN’ YOU OUT, POPS!) and everyone was sufficiently either toasted or tired. Some of us then venture up to my room, and shenanigans ensued. THUS ENDETH COLIN AND ROSE DAY!

Sunday:

While I was sad this seemed like a less crazy day for us, I was also a bit relieved because hot DAMN was I tired after the day before. Still, we didn’t have much time to really collect ourselves because the Mills fam gold panel started at 10, so a group of us wandered down to breakfast.

We then get in to see Andrew, Lana, and Bex, where Lana and Bex were of course hysterical together, Andy looked cute, and you could feel the collective vibrating of all Regina and Zelena fans which was adorable. I mean, I love Regina, but there was some LOVE in that room from her Evil Regals. I do wish Andy had gotten a bit more attention or had been a bit more vocal, but it’s got to be hard to not just let Lana and Bex own the stage.

There was then a decent break before Bex’s panel. That woman, as you all likely know, is HYSTERICAL. She kept the room laughing through most of her panel, and you can see she has nothing but love for her fans and her costars.

After her panel, I don’t have anything I’m too fussed about until 2 (MILAH WAS ROBBED IN THAT VID CONTEST, BTW, JUST SAYING) and so some of us gather together for lunch in, you guessed it, the hotel pub! Dudes, our options were limited and it looked like a library and had loaded potato soup. What more do you want?

It’s then time to MEET LANA, where me, Mabs, and Capt try to strategically settle ourselves somewhere out of the way but close enough to the side door to get a good look at the queen as she walks in. And, DAMN, that woman is gorgeous! Me and Capt then leap into the line where she proceeds to get two very adorable photos done and then I get pulled in to get hugged by Lana (!!!!!!!!!) while Capt hugs her from the back. She was super sweet and patient the whole time with everyone, and you could really see how much she loves spending time with her fans.

We then decide some of us need shots because some of us (*cough* Capt *cough*) are about to pass out from being so near Her Majesty’s presence, and then we wander into the ballroom for Henry Squared’s panel. Andy was adorable, Jared was typical Jared. I’ll be honest, I don’t have anything from that panel that seems to stick out to me as a solid memory, though maybe that was the whiskey shot’s fault.

Then comes Lana’s panel and, once again, you can feel the energy of the Evil Regals in the room. For however silly Colin, Rose, and KnightRook panels are, HOLY DAMN Lana panels are just filled with all sorts of emotions! It was like a damn rollercoaster! I laughed, I teared up, I was generally all over the place. SO MANY FEELINGS, GUYS. It was delightful but also made me just desperately need to laugh about fart jokes with my fellow Colin heathens. WE DON’T KNOW EMOTIONS.

Sadly during the following break, it is time to say farewell to the spun sugar that is Lillpon. I console myself knowing I’ll see her again, but it’s depressingly others’ last time with her, but ONLY FOR NOW. Yes? Yes.

Next up is autos with Andrew and then Lana. Andrew was a sweetheart. I was standing next to Capt and Mabs, where we proceeded to tell him how great we thought he was in season 7 and how much that season and his performance in it meant to us and brought back some love for the show. He seemed genuinely touched and said it meant a lot to him to hear that. Bless that boy.

We then wait a bit for me, Capt, Mabs, and Milah to venture up for Lana’s autos. By the time we got to her, we had this whole strategic thing planned out where I’d bring up S7 Hooked Queen, Capt gets her Hooked Queen picture signed, and Mabs gets the word for Capt’s tattoo. Lana says she did expect when they started that she thought Hook and Regina were going to be a thing but alas. Oh! And Mabs tells her that they’ve got family from the same area of Sicily, where Lana proceeds to say they do kinda look alike, and it is now confirmed #fam.

With everything over, we head once again to, YOU GUESSED IT AGAIN, the hotel pub. Chesty and Fraddit have already settled in and eaten, and me, Mabs, Capt, Overthinker, and Milah get ourselves all ordered up where we both mourn the end of the weekend and still buzz from the high the last three days had given us. A series of more shenanigans ensues, and none of us are ready for the weekend to be over. I’m pretty sure we collectively tried to drag it out for as long as possible.

For one last hurrah, we then venture to the pool again and meet up with @reginamotherfuckingmills and @agntreginaskywalker, where we all debrief and collectively laugh about the weekend, in addition to getting all into our feels about how Swan Queen fans and Hook fans are being all chill and friendly with each other. WHO KNEW PEOPLE COULD HUMAN?!

It was a fantastic end to the weekend, and there were more days ahead that involved ridiculous conversations in the car (Thicc Lady and Pointy Boi! Is this Central Park?! etc), meeting Mabs’s ENTIRE FAMILY, hearing Chesty lose her mind several times, enjoying super Long Island experiences with them, Milah, Overthinker, and Fraddit, and so on. Some of us also went sailing on a tall boat later, where we hoisted the main sail and felt like proper pirates! Then there was just general hanging out, but I won’t bore you further with that.

Instead, I’ll bore you with shoutouts!

@lillpon DESCUSTANG!!! You’re such a damn delight. Both sharing a bed and hoisting the main sail with you was brilliant and I love you forever. YOU MET COLIN!!!

@queen-mabs-revenge What are words? I have none. And if I started I’d probably turn into a mess so FARTS BELLY PT CRUISER POINTY BOI FARTS! I’ll probably emotion at some point and send it to you in private and then go run off to watch bloopers or something to get back to some sort of state of normal.

@fraddit SEVEN?! WHAT’S IN THE BOX?! Resting judge face or no, you’re fantastic, I love you, and you’re forever welcome in my apartment! Or basically anywhere with me.

@thesschesthair You funny asshole, I don’t know what I would have done without you to be there to say jokes as foul as mine. You were such a good sport about me being an annoying shit. I’m keeping my fingers and toes crossed we can celebrate your birthday with a Captain Charming shindig!!!

@justmilah You’re so sweet and so funny and just damn precious. I LOVED going to the American Girls store, traipsing around Rockefeller Center, exploring actual Central Park, getting Millian and Knightrook feels in the AMNH, and wasting time at Johnny Utah’s with you. You’re always welcome!!!

@captregina Mah darling! I’m so glad and relieved that you had a good experience! You earned it, and I’m excited to talk about it over brunch with you.

@theonceoverthinker YOU FAVORITE PHD GENIUS! Stellar questions from a stellar person. It was amazing to hang out with you and we should do it again soon!!!

@the-girl-in-the-band-tshirt You’re a precious angel and it was delightful to meet you! I’m so glad you felt welcomed into the fold. But, of course you were! You’re wonderful!

@brave-lassie From one “mom” to another, thanks! Also, you’re a sweetheart and YOU MAKE AN AMAZING RED!!!

@leiandcharles @freifraufischer @coaldustcanary @reginamotherfuckingmills and @agntreginaskywalker IT WAS LOVELY TO MEET YOU ALL! And thank you for being so patient and awesome with some of the shenanigans.

#ouat nj #long mcfriggin post #I WANTED TO REMEMBER EVERYTHING!!!#and i still probably left stuff out

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mylutteoheart · 6 years

Text

Con mis besos yo te haré feliz. Mil flores y regalos yo te daré.

this is part 2 of my fic for day 1. I accidentally deleted it but I re-wrote it and it’s not the exact same thing as the original but I feel like this version is better.

Also, I won’t be participating tomorrow because I couldn’t really come up with a good story.

prompt: “I offer you my bed to sleep in because our respective roommates are getting it on in your room and take the sofa to sleep on, only I wake up back in my bed with your tiny body wrapped around me and damn me if it isn’t the cutest thing I’ve ever seen”

find my other fics here

Luna got back home late. She had a late night class at her Uni. She was happy to finally be back at her apartment. But when she arrived, something weird was going on.

When she unlocked the door, she heard some noises. I took her a while to figure out where they came from. Eventually, she figured out that they came from her bedroom. She was very confused about this all. So she decided to check it out. Her door was closed, which was weird because she never closes that door. She slowly opened it because she was a little scared about what she might find there.

To her surprise, she found Gastón and Nina lying down on her bed. Only, the thing was that one was lying on top of the other and she quietly stepped backwards in shock.

"I was shocked too." she heard a familiar voice from behind her. Of course it was Matteo, he was standing in the doorway, he probably heard her come home. It isn't a suprise since they live next to each other.

The sudden voice did startle her a little. "Matteo, you startled me." she said in all honesty.

"I can see that and I can't blame you. Having someone so handsome standing in your doorway all of a sudden is very surprising." he gave her his typical smirk. She just smiled and shook her head. "Why don't you come over to my apartment? You can't stay here whil you saw what you saw now can you?" he asked.

She hesitated at first but she agreed in the end. They went together to his apartment. He immediately walked to the kitchen and offered her a plate full of food. "I'm guessing you weren't able to eat yet and as luck would have it, I cooked for Gastón until I discovered where he was at." he gave her a comforting smile and agreed to eat it. He apparently hadn't eaten yet either so he took his plate and hers and put it on the table so they could eat together.

It felt a bit weird for Luna to do this, they have been on a few dates before and this just felt like an actual date but she didn't want to make the remark. Instead, she tried to enjoy her dinner and she did. It was delicious and she thanked him for the food.

They put their plates and other dishes in the dishwasher and suddenly, Matteo got nervous and she noticed so she did what she could and gave him an assuring smile and she took his hand in his. This gave him enough courage to say what he wanted to: "Do you want to sleep over? Your room is taken at the moment and I don't think it would be nice to sleep in the same house as them."

They haven't really made it official yet so she didn't really know what to say and he could see the panic on her face "Of course I'll let you sleep in my bed and I'll sleep on the couch. Gastón's room is very messy so you don't want to sleep in there." he squeezed her hand lightly and this made her give in and she said yes. This made Matteo very happy and he hugged her.

She went to her own apartment to get her pjs, she decided it'd be best if she changed at Matteo's place because she didn't want to stay here long. She was in and then out.

Matteo was excited that Luna was staying over but sadly, it wasn't like he imagined the first this would happen. He didn't want to go too fast with her because he didn't want to mess this up. It was pretty safe to say that after the couple of dates they had, he had strong feelings for her and he didn't want to change that.

Luna went to the bathroom and it took everything in Matteo to stay away from that room. It was tempting, yes, but he couldn't.

She had her hair in a ponytail and she was wearing shorts and a top. "You look amazing." it came out before he knew it but it made her smile. That always made him feel better, no matter what. Her smile was radiant just like she was.

They both went to sleep at the same time. Both happy to be here.

Luna woke up in the middle of the night to get a glass of water and on her way to the kitchen, she came across Matteo sleeping on the couch. She took a minute to take in the view. He looked so handsome just sleeping there. But he didn't really seem comfortable, she couldn't really enjoy the view for long because he kept turning. He obviously couldn't find a comfortable position and she felt bad. She couldn't allow him to suffer so as soon as he was facing her again, she decided to wake him up. She tried to shake him lightly at first but he slept too deep to notice it.

After a couple of minutes thinking, she decided to go with a more drastic approach. She had to admit, she didn't want it to be like this but she couldn't come up with anything else so she leaned in slowly. Then, she put her lips on his and in a somewhat automatic response, he kissed her back. Not opening his eyes but waking up. Then when realization hit him, he woke up.

He shot up in surprise. When he saw who just kissed him, he made place for her to sit on the couch next to him. "I'm sorry." was all she said.

"Why did you do that?" he just wanted to know.

"I wanted to wake you up and at first I couldn't and then this is what I came up with." she admitted shyly.

"Why did you want to wake me up?" he was really confused.

"I saw you sleeping and you looked very uncomfortable, I couldn't stand seeing you like that." she looked away so he wouldn't see her shyness.

This comment made him smile anyway. "And how are you going to fix that?" he was a bit amused.

"I was thinking that maybe you could sleep in your bed as well." now it was her turn to be nervous.

"You don't mind?" he asked seriously.

"No, of course not." this made her turn to him and smile.

"Okay, then." it's the only thing he could say. This gave her the invitation to take his hand in hers and lead him to his bed. She did all of this with confidence. They both got in the bed, they were both a bit unsure. They eventually decided to turn their backs towards each other. It seemed like the best thing to do.

When they both fell asleep, unconsciously, Matteo turned on his back and Luna turned around to face him. After a while, they were lying closer within each other's reach. Then, Luna put her arm and her leg around him. They stayed like this for the rest of the night.

Matteo was the first one to wake up. He slowly opened his eyes and he felt all kinds of butterflies inside his stomach and he felt a warmth going through his body and then he realized what happened. Luna's body was wrapped around him and honestly, it was the cutest thing he has ever seen. He wanted this moment to last because he had no idea if this was going to happen again. He wanted this all the time, waking up and seeing her beside him. He would even want to have lazy morning kisses. This made him flashback to last night. They kissed for the first time and he never imagined it like this. But he couldn't complain, he was happy to finally have kissed her even if he was very sleepy at the time.

But now it was time for her to wake up and as soon as she realized how they were lying, her cheeks started to get red. It made this even more adorable for him. Without thinking, he gave her a kiss on her head and this seemed to take her blushing away.

"Why are you looking at me like that?" she asked after some time. He didn't take his eyes off her and he smiled from ear to ear and his eyes were shining.

“I offer you my bed to sleep in because our respective roommates are getting it on in your room and take the sofa to sleep on, only I wake up back in my bed with your tiny body wrapped around me and damn me if it isn’t the cutest thing I’ve ever seen” he said in one breath.

They lied there for a few moments more until he eventually got up but she didn't want to. She was too comfortable. This gave him an idea. His smirk kind of gave it away and she got scared of what was about to happen. He ignored her warning looks and he took her in his arms, bridal style and she couldn't help but let out a giggle and he laughed on his turn. He put her on the counter of the kitchen and he started to make breakfast. It was pancakes. She watched him make them. It was very entertaining for her and they just laughed all the time. They acted as if it has been like this for years, it was just so natural for both of them.

When the pancakes were done, he put them on the kitchen table and helped her off the counter. She was about to sit down when he stopped her in her tracks by intertwining her fingers with his. This made her turn around and he could see a look of confusion on her face. He leaned in and eventually, his lips landed on hers and in a matter of seconds, they were kissing intensely. Nothing mattered but their lips touching. This was the kind of kiss he imagined and it felt so good. Bolts of electricity were felt as they were touching. His one hand on her waist and his other hand still intertwined with hers. Her other hand was on his cheek. The world seemed to fade away.

After a while, they pulled apart to finally eat something and now they both hopedmore sleepovers like this would happen and he wanted to kiss her a thousands times over. Luckily, there was time for all of that.

#soy luna #lutteo #lutteoficweek #my soy luna fic #queued because summer job

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kido-swagomi · 6 years

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this is one of those posts that I really shouldn’t make but am just absolutely out of shits to give and the bridges are burned anyway. So fuck it.

I wanted to talk to my therapist about this today but we ended up talking about a different issue instead, so I’m just going to vent on Tumblr because I’m sure that’s healthy. If you’re actually reading this expect no actual structure or purpose to this post. This is like the definition of a vent post.

So Aiareck. That blue dude in my icon. He’s my fursona. But he didn’t start off that way, he was originally a DnD character, made for a phenomenal campaign run by one of my closest friends. Past tense. That game took a lot of my energy, and it was by my choice. I was enraptured with the world the DM had created. Obsessed, really. My personality tends to lead to that. I had a massive backstory for Aiareck - dude was 42 at the time of the game so he had plenty of life behind him to write about. Fantastic adventures. Tragedy. Romance. The whole nine yards. I spent hours dreaming up characters and stories for Aiareck to interact with. My intent was to actually write this backstory out as a short story/novella/thing (spoiler, I never did because I’m so bad at actually writing things, I just have a bunch of character bios that tell the story through those).

Cut to about 5 months after the campaign started. One soft-restart after the OG party was a nightmare and we paused the campaign to focus on a different one before removing someone from our current group and bringing a new person in. I made the mistake of dating another player in the game. They flew out to visit me and meet in person for the first time since we started dating. Visit didn’t go well. They went home early. We broke up the day after.

Day after that, the DM ends the campaign.

Three weeks later, them, and most of that group, cut off all contact with me. Me specifically. I know they’re still in touch with one-another. Just me.

These people were some of my best friends. I had known the DM for six years. The rest I met with the campaign, but we became fast friends. And they just. Cut me out. No explanation. No arguments. No reason. Just shut me out.

My ex and I didn’t have an angry breakup. We agreed it wasn’t gonna work. We wanted to still be friends - or at least that’s what they told me. I know I did. We hadn’t even been dating two months, I could get over it. Wanted to just take a few weeks off from the game or something to deal with the grief, then get back into it and just be friends again. Easy.

But no. Instead I get shut completely out. No connection left. It was complete and total. Every single social network under the sun that we were mutual friends/followers on. Gone. A huge aspect of my life was just swept out from under me. A dear friend, whom I had already given a second chance after they did some pretty fucked up shit and shut me out before, did it all over again (fool me twice, eh?), the first relationship I had been in in 7 years, the campaign I had sunk so many hours into as a player, gone. Just like that.

Queue major depression spell. Went hard on painting Warhammer models to pass the time. Ended up getting burnt out on that and have barely painted since April. Started my own campaign with a different party in May in some desperate attempt to get back what I had before, and I’m rapidly losing motivation to continue that endeavor. Work continues to blow ass. And my self-esteem is basically shot and at this point I’m just convinced I’m going to be single for the rest of my life because of my own social awkwardness and anxieties.

But hey, at least I’m getting a bird in a few weeks, eh?

But what does this have to do with Aiareck? The blue boy from the start of the post. Well, even before all of this shit happened I had decided that after years of not having one, he was gonna be my fursona outside of the campaign. I love this boy. I got a really great badge commissioned of him to wear to cons. If by some miracle I ever acquire the money to pay for it I’d love to get at least a partial suit based off of him.

And now he’s got all these bad memories associated with him. I told myself after this all went down that I was still going to finish writing his story. I was too invested in it not to. Spoiler: I didn’t. Because every time I’d try to I’d find myself infuriated. He reminded me of what I had lost. This stupid blue bird had suddenly become a symbol for the shit that drove what had started as a pretty okay year for me into the fucking ground.

That’s where my obsessive compulsive tendencies rolled their ugly fucking head. My brain wasn’t done obsessing over him and his story - it’s still not done. I pace the floor on slow days at work thinking about his story. About his adoptive mother. About how he ended an attempted coup on his homeland by eliminating the perpetrator, who was his own mentor. About how lost his parents at a young age and made his way after that carrying on his father’s love of music and dance, and spent his teenage years as a busker in his home city.

I think about how in the campaign, his home was under siege by the big bad, and now he’ll never get to save it. He’ll never figure out what the big secret that pirate captain was keeping from him was, or get back the Super Legendary Awesome Pistol™ from her that was stolen from his home years ago. And I can’t even ask anyone what the possible outcomes were. The only person who knows decided I’m some kind of bastard that should be shut out at any cost for reasons that I’ll probably never know.

I wanted to be able to detach Aiareck from those memories. To compartmentalize them and eliminate the negative associations so I could still enjoy developing this character that I’ve spent so much time on and want to literally represent me in online space. And eventually (still working on this one) have him redesigned with a more ‘modern’ appearance to detach him from his roots as a DnD character (at least outwardly). I intended the commission I got of him recently to be a kind of “last hurrah” for Aiareck the DnD character, and then I’d get a new character sheet done up with the “new” Aiareck.

Of course I’d still have his DnD story and if I ever get the opportunity I would absolutely play as him in a new campaign. I loved him too much not to.

But despite my efforts, I’ve utterly failed to detach him. Those memories still come back. That anger is still there. The absolutely un-fucking-shakable feeling that I’ve done something horrible to wrong these people I considered friends to warrant the treatment I’ve gotten and I don’t even fucking know what it is I could have done. And I don’t even mean that from a stupid, arrogant “I can do no wrong” stance. I mean I’ve seriously tried to look back at my behavior and my actions and I can find absolutely nothing that explains this response. I’m not going to sit here and pretend I’m a perfect person. Let’s be real, I’m an asshole. I know I can be a royal pain in the ass sometimes. I make plenty of damn mistakes. I made mistakes in the group setting of this DnD campaign. I made mistakes while my now-ex visited. I made mistakes in that relationship before they visited.

Yet, evidently, I did do something horrible. And I’m either too stupid or too full of myself to begin to have even the faintest idea of what it is.

There’s another hit to the ol’ self-esteem. ‘Cause I really needed another one of those.

I don’t even really know where I’m going with this anymore. Just... I just want to love my bird boi. I just want to be able to move on. But I’m so fucking incapable of doing that. It’s infuriating. It’s something about myself I fucking hate. I just can’t get over shit.

Seems like a lot of emotion over a stupid anthropomorphic bird. If only I could shed that emotion.

#personal bullshit #ridiculously incredibly stupidly unnecessarily long post #like fr

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